Review by Jeger on June 16, 2024.

France’s Seth! Underrated and criminally overlooked until recently with the release of their La Morsure Du Christ LP that awakened us all into the bliss of churchly incinerations on a massive scale! The crumbling of great cathedrals and the dawning of a new age of wisdom and illumination. And some damn fine black metal, too. My choice for 2021 album of the year - a landmark record - one that represents everything that is great about the French scene: elegance, eloquence and prestige… Now, we find ourselves just months away from yet another triumph out of Seth. On July 14, our beloved desecrators of the faith will unveil their highly-anticipated brand new LP, La France Des Maudits, once again through Season Of Mist. 

Seth have chosen once again to record their material in French, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. What a rich compliment to the music. The ethos! The grandiosity of it all converging into this epic black metal experience. Savory melodies set to smooth double-bass currents and fluid tom rolls. So much to absorb as far as the visceral components of the record: somber, triumphant and soulful - a fists-clenched, eyes closed type of an album - passion igniting like wildfire under every passage and blazing into an atmosphere alive with subtle symphonic elements. Fiendish vocals: desperate and loathing to contrast otherwise gorgeous black metal rife with chorales and majestic tremolo riffs in memorable album cuts like 'Paris Des Maléfices' and 'Et Que Vive Le Diable !'. 'Dans Le Coeur Un Poignard' - a commanding performance! Godlike riffing passages booming atop the thunder of a thousand drums it seems. Gravitational bass parts and just the majesty of it all; a feast of fire for the pyro! An awe-inspiring contribution to this opus. Black metal on the world-class tip, no compromise and no comparison. Quite simply on their own plateau, soon to be Alpine vantage o’er the scene. And if the jaw-dropping 'Insurrection' in all of its malevolent glory doesn’t tantalize your sweet spot then nothing will. An album for the curmudgeonly purist? Not today. This is black metal deserving of all the modern trim; a grande ceremony! A commemorative toast to the death of all that is holy and realized through cutting edge recording techniques. 

To see Seth backed by such a fine label and producing such formidable albums is the way it should be. It’s what they deserve and it’s what they’re capable of. A band so deserving of notoriety now getting their just kudos. An album in La France Des Maudits that demands the respect of critics and the envy of artists to propel them into a horizon ablaze by the inferno of a thousand churches. Champions of the unholy war and vandals to all that is sacred. Let the blasphemies commence! 

Rating: 9.5 out of 10