Description
Formed in Edinburgh in 2013 by displaced Frenchman Victor Vicart and native Scot Dudley Tait, post-metal prog-sludge artisans Dvne have been building a powerful head of steam since their second album, 2021's kaleidoscopically mesmerising Etemen ?nka. Their first release for the legendary Metal Blade Records label, the LP was a concerted hike up the greasy pole for this enigmatic outfit, enabling Dvne to embark on UK and European headline tours and win spots at such discerning festivals as Hellfest, ArcTanGent, Desertfest, Damnation and Resurrection. A live EP of reimagined album tunes, 2022's Cycles Of Asphodel, kept up their profile while satiating demand from a rapidly mushrooming fanbase, and now in 2024, stunning third album Voidkind looks set to propel this expanded five-piece line-up (welcoming Maxime Keller on keyboards) to the top of their game.
Certainly Voidkind succeeds in finding new modes of expression for Dvne. The songs are more pointed, direct and memorable, but the soundscape still a radiant, evolving, hypnotic flow, the effect achieved with fewer layers of sonic ornamentation, consciously urging closer to Dvne's incendiary live sound. And despite the addition of a full-time keyboardist, Victor has no doubt about the album's defining feature: "We wanted very distinct left and right guitars, and punchier drums and bass, which would transcribe better live. And the synths needed to be clearer; it's very easy to put five guitars on each side, loads of different vocals and keys, but then you end up watching a band with an album you really like, and the songs sound nothing like the record. That's what we wanted to avoid. As soon as the song starts, we want people to immediately recognise the riff."
Conceptually, the lyrics continue the band's overarching narrative - "following a religious group through the generation line from the beginning to its end" - while Voidkind's extraordinary sleeve art depicts the main theme of this chapter: "A godlike entity seducing & luring followers through their dreams and these followers' multigenerational journey to reach their god dimension." Victor reveals one book has been particularly impactful on the band's thought process: 1989 novel Hyperion by Dan Simmonds. "It's a very dark sci-fi book with loads of interesting parts, so you can go really prog with it, but you can also go more violent and animalistic." Further inspirational touchstones include FromSoftware video game Dark Souls, and the Japanese manga series that inspired it, Berserk: "It's a very cool, violent, psychedelic, mediaeval dark fantasy," explains Victor. "We wanted to have these kinds of visuals and aesthetics on this album, in this mix-up of things. Even without the vocals we wanted to evoke something, different places and spaces, and take the listener on a journey."
