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Vessels

by Be'lakor

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cbotiza
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cbotiza 'The Smoke of Many Fires' is one of the best songs ever written. Favorite track: The Smoke of Many Fires.
bcb723
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bcb723 How does this band continue to maintain such consistent greatness? Nothing is out of place, every song has been given the Be'lakor songwriting treatment. Honestly amazing and exhilarating to watch the band's progression. Also contains my all-time favorite Be'lakor moment: the change up at 6:30 in "An Ember's Arc" till the end is just humbling to hear. An insane 3rd straight melodeath classic by this band. Favorite track: An Ember's Arc.
cn5800
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cn5800 This is truly exceptionnal melodeath.
Another epic album from this group of extremely talented musicians and songwriters. Just, wow. Favorite track: The Smoke of Many Fires.
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1.
Luma 01:59
Light’s flash within the pall, Always there, yet unaware, A thread that runs through all Time bleeds through while From order they, to disarray, Are torn from the thread And so…
2.
It began, as these things do, From clouds in the aether With untold time, they coalesced, Their will apart grew weaker This cascade of embers, Fused into a star's ignition A crucible for their collapse, Seething crux of its ambition The axiom of this expanse, Unrelenting pressure Every moment, in each place, Collisions beyond measure An ordinary pair that met, Whilst merging into one, Heaved and spat a mote of light, Adrift within the Sun Without a bind, it cut away, Against all else it stood As swift as anything that was, And had, or could, that would The axiom when it began, Unable to elude Every moment, in each place, Destroyed, exchanged, renewed At the surface once emerged, Radiant in birth Free at last, its final form, The photon dashed for Earth
3.
Far from the Sun And that frantic dash Billions before it, To Earth, had crashed But in this expanse Where huge trees unraveled A new plant was struggling Where light seldom traveled This small searching stem Glimpsed dawn upon dawn, Dwarfed by gnarled limbs From the day it was born Hope given over To all that is brief Amidst the detritus, Dead leaf upon leaf As its withering strands Arched back towards earth, Above it, a movement - A death to bring birth Rays filtered, then poured As a forefather fell With the passing of giants, The stem could now tell That life would come quickly, And it did, as it gorged Transformed by the day As the fueling light forged Fixated above, The sky its sole purpose, Its oblivious growth Led the insects to surface And small though they were, En masse, they had come To gnaw at its base As it reached for the Sun
4.
Though wounds were great, and respite scant, Life clung to that wretched plant Its skin was scarred, its leaves were ripped, Damned to wait, as roots were fixed For every hour, in hopeless fear, It felt them leave then draw back near The insects drudged without a sound, And tore the plant down to the ground Among them, one drone like any other, Stole away to meet another Far from the swarm, the two had hidden Their unborn child, which was forbidden Spiteful mind and eyes unseen, Betrayed unto to a ruthless Queen Condemned - the two would die alone, Their egg was cast on to the stones An offering to slake the earth, Despite its lot, the child emerged From hatching breath, its life was dire, In every dawn, the sky brought fire It sought its kind, and as it roamed, Out of sight and far from home, A pack could see that, left alive, The child would lead them to the hive Behind the hatchling, like a storm, The giants fell upon the swarm, With hungry teeth and gleeful hearts, Those hunters pulled the Queen apart
5.
Whelm 07:19
As the hunters surged within, The roof began to fall Fractured chitin underfoot, Whilst ichor soaked the halls Then gathering, the pack reformed, For once they’d all consumed, They flooded from the earth in which The hive was now a tomb A rushing mass of fur and claws, The host would move as one Provided each could keep apace, Those creatures feared none Each component of the whole, A spoke, for now, that linked Dispensable—when it should break, The rest would let it sink When river’s water blocked their path, They lingered over moss A chain of stones bound shore to bank, And each would have to cross They navigated snout to tail, The smallest one was knocked As treacherous waters surged, It shattered on the rocks One component of the whole, A spoke, that now, had snapped Dispensable—it served no use, The others would adapt Silently, it understood, And, broken beyond mend, It watched the other hunters leave, Then waited for the end
6.
7.
Just downstream from that dark place, Where last beats fell and waters churned A man looked down upon his face… In reverie, his thoughts did turn: To follow the river is to follow the arc It does not drift, it does not wait Find its course with limb and mind There walks a man; There runs his fate To follow the river is to follow the thread It does not lie, it does not leave Drowning stones there as he does, He comes to think; He comes to breathe Something of that ember lives! He feels it bide, he feels it wake Looking out, but at itself, As if to speak; As if to make His vision forming, flowing now In tumbling verse, in melting song Crafting words there as he does They echo out, They echo on: “But a vessel, alive, For a time, I would thrive, That was all, Nothing more lay below it… But a vessel, adrift, Not a theft, nor a gift, That was all - But a pulse, but a poet” To drink from the river is to meet with the arc And drink until quenched The man did But a vessel, adrift, Not a theft, nor a gift, That was all - But a pulse
8.
The river had brought with it much that day From driftwood to blood from the ember Some things were hidden while others were seen Yet the man somehow could not remember Having ambled away from the water's banks to return to his tribe and their lights He soon found a failing of flesh, and of mind they were no longer robust or bright What he could not have seen was the sickness upstream Those abandoned remains of the wasted What he could not have known Was the blight of the bone In each ebb and each flow he had tasted Dawn found him ailing delirium rife Those he loved feared his illness would wander With time wearing thin, his young eyes clouded in As the odour of smoke became stronger It was then that he heard the sharp crackle of torches Carried past him by men from his clan A panic cut through all the life that he knew It was over before it began Rope looped his wrists And held tight to his veins As beside him His relatives sagged And with tears in their eyes Through confusion and cries Out towards the wild flames he was dragged Like billions before him regardless of form It ended as chance had decided So briefly contained an inferno's refrain Having powered and angered and guided At the heart of the blaze awareness dissolved Light ascended devoid of desire From a trail intertwined life and death strewn behind To the stars it returned from the fire

about

Vessels is Be'lakor's fourth full-length, and first concept album.

"“Vessels is undoubtedly their highest achievement. Be'lakor have showed themselves to be a singular talent, coming up with one of the year's best. Again.” - Loud Magazine, 95%

“Vessels is immediately attention-grabbing and, ultimately, an inspiring piece of music that is borderline genre-defining… When I think of exceptional melodic death metal, I will now think of Vessels.” - Sputnik Music, 4.5/5

"This album succeeds at basically everything; every aspect of Vessels has been explored with forethought and played with passion. There are shades of brilliance in the instrumentation, the rhythms, the song structures, the intonations, the production, the melodies - too many things to spell out." - Metalstorm.net, 9.0
© NAPALM RECORDS

credits

released June 24, 2016

‘Vessels’ was recorded during 2015 at Legion Studio Productions, Melbourne. Mixed and engineered by Julian Renzo. Produced by Julian Renzo and Be’lakor. Mastered by Ryan Smith at Sterling Sound, New York City. Ambient sounds of the wild recorded at Cataract Gorge, Tasmania. Additional programming and soundscapes by Julian Renzo.

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Be'lakor Melbourne, Australia

Founded in 2004, Be'lakor is an Australian melodic/progressive death metal band. belakorband.com

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