NO REMAINS "NOTHING LAST" TAPE

Limited to 50 copies.

Quote from OOE Records:

Debut demo of this side project by DPR of the renowned Osculum Infame. No Remains' first offering is an unflinchingly bleak and deeply nihilistic work of depressive black metal that calls to mind Filosofem and the specter of the 90’s underground. In an era when DSBM has increasingly become a beacon for genre tourists attracted to the vanity of self-indulgent sorrow, No Remains rejects the romantic melancholy of its popular contemporaries and reclaims the darker tradition of this style on Nothing Last.

Nothing Last’s 27 minute runtime is framed between intro and outro samples hinting at a
continuity throughout the demo’s 6 tracks. These production touches are tastefully used here and elsewhere on the release to give the entire work a narrative quality; it is not a stretch to imagine the demo as the despaired tale of one whose damnation was cosmically ordained, a fact of birth that was never within their control. Sonically, Nothing Last is comprised of trance-inducing slow- to mid-tempo black metal that reserves higher tempos and intensities to highlight climactic moments in the compositions. The vocals, delivered in an anguished, raving wail, have a touch of Urfaustian madness to them, and one can faintly detect other similarities to the Dutch duo in No Remains’ skilled use of melody and atmosphere. All these elements are brought to bear to create the dreamlike malaise that casts its pall over Nothing Last. Yet it would be a mistake to characterize the demo as purely wallowing in misery: there is a latent viciousness underneath Nothing Last’s gloomy disposition, and it rears its head most formidably on the stand-out closing track. While the predominant overtone of the release is an inwards-directed hatred that manifests itself as self-destructive impulses, The Angels are Falling turns this hatred outwards, snarling with unexpected ferocity like the violent paroxysm of one awakening from rumination to lash out at the world one final time. Whether the audio vignette that concludes both this track and the demo itself is intended as a conclusion or doomed continuation of the despair described herein is left as an exercise to the listener.