Review by Felix on April 17, 2025.

I no longer remember when and where I stumbled over Zørza, but I know that it was a good move from my side. The unit from Poland released its first full-length album a few months ago, and it is a very interesting album. Expect no less than large-format black metal that combines width and depth. The band paints almost monumental pictures. Elegant melody lines are designed with professional nonchalance, but no need to panic; this approach is not at the expense of stormy massiveness. Does a spiritual-musical connection exist between Quebec and Poland? The arrangements of the first songs after the average intro (thunder, ravens, percussion, and horns) seem to indicate this invisible line.

By the way, I am speaking about fantastic and fanatic tracks. The quasi-opener 'Night Of The Werewolves' whips with vehemence across gloomy fields. It has a break in the middle of the song, where we can hear the werewolves howl. Nonetheless, the characterising features of the piece are its majestic melodies that liaise with breathtaking speed, the organic, dynamic flow, and a natural catchiness. Right from the start, Zørza shines with a remarkable maturity and a feeling for a successful combination of fast-paced rhythms and sublime harmonies. The following tracks confirm this impression emphatically. Both 'Death II' and 'Lunacy Of Memories' show that the duo has already found a way to implement its musical vision in a coherent manner. These songs leave the signature of Zørza and I must say it consists of clear, sweeping lines without any sign of unsteadiness. Perhaps we can discuss the vocals, because they have a lot of massive reverb on it. But that’s neither unusual nor really problematic. More important is that they deliver a very raw element. Okay, the melodies are not so airy that they need an unruly corrective. Nevertheless, a portion of the powerful roaring is, of course, welcome.

Hellven reaches its second peak with 'The Crown With Silver Thorns'. Don’t be fooled by the softness of the first guitar tones. They quickly give way to massive, steely guitars with an alarming sound. Another prime example of dense, melodic yet apocalyptic and irresistible black metal breaks loose. I have heard that some people call the band’s style post-black metal. Is this because of a few unconventional breaks like the one in “The Crown…”? I don’t know – and I don’t care. What is a fact is that the song’s main line has deadly, misanthropic vibrations in abundance. Its guitars ignite a conflagration of unimagined dimensions. Honestly, to me this is nothing but pure black metal – and that’s really marvellous.

Unfortunately, Zørza slow themselves down a little on the way to an absolute top rating with a pure ambient song that, at over three minutes long, allows far too much space to breathe. But this piece alone is not able to withdraw the original, inner strength from Hellven. The band swiftly finds its way back to the depths of the human soul. Especially the sluggishly starting 'Under The Reign Of The Black Moon' oscillates in its mood between air-raid alert and deathbed. Zørza see no point in suppressing the eerie component in their work. I can't say whether it's the ghosts of the past or future horror scenarios that torment the listener here, but in any case, the result sounds excellent and makes “Under the Reign...” definitely the third star of this album. By the way, the sound of the album supports the compositions effectively. It does not score with total transparency, but its slightly blurred appearance reinforces the density of the songs. Finally, a good instrumental and an equally proper cover song make the album complete. What can I say? Either it is the cold, wintery mood and the long darkness outside that gives me the right feeling for listening to albums such as Hellven or the album is simply great, regardless of the season. Never mind. As a black metal fan, you definitely miss a dramatic, Armageddon-announcing album, if you do not dive into Hellven.

Rating: 8.7 out of 10

Review by Michael on July 4, 2024.

Sometimes YouTube is a pretty helpful tool when it comes to discovering new bands. Lately this has happened to two bands I didn't have my black metal radar on. The first one I’d like to introduce to you here is Polish Zørza, which according to all-knowing Metal Archives, is a so-called post-black metal band. Fortunately I haven't read this categorization before listening to the album, otherwise I guess I wouldn't have checked them out because I really HATE this genre.

Fortunately I don’t really consider this kind of music as post-anything. What Zørza performs on their debut album Hellven is some quite orthodox black metal with a lot of tremolo-picking, blast beats and hellish screams, wrapped into some modern sound. Maybe you could describe it as a mixture between Polish, Dutch, French and Scandinavian black metal – maybe the term European black metal must be invented for it. Nevertheless the music is highly melodic and absolutely comprehendible. Not that you could foresee the next step they are going to do but this all makes sense and matches together very well. But apart from this slight desperate and hateful fundamental tone there is also a vulnerable aspect in the music. Just check the first “real” song (I don't count the intro ‘Western Forest Rites’ as real song in this case) ‘Night Of The Werewolf’ up to the end where you will find some soft piano tunes quite similar to what Rammstein did in “Deutschland” (which is one of not too many tracks by them I really love – song and video). This is a fantastic example to show how close hate and sadness often are next to each other and maybe also are the reason for each other. ‘Lunacy Of Memories’ brings on some more Scandinavian black metal influences and kicks ass with its fast pace. But again, there are some breaks that show some kind of fragility and thoughtfulness. This song reminds me literally of a lunatic who stabs down his victim but in some light moments reflects his doing and continues after some seconds to do his bloody work.

‘The Crown With Silver Thorns’ has a very repetitive beginning and starts (matching perfectly to the title) very epic and turns into a thunderstorm of brutal riffs in its progress. But again, also here the aggressive atmosphere is lightened up with some acoustic tunes – hm…when I look out of my window right now, the weather is comparable. It was raining cats and dogs three minutes ago and now I see the sun shining. With ‘Danse Macabre’ you can find a five minute long instrumental song on Hellven, too which doesn't get too monotone though because of the variety. Quite often instrumentals aren't very innovative and entertaining but in this case it is okay. I mean, this one does not show any news compared to the previous songs but it also doesn't disappoint. Closing their own compositions with 'Under The Reign Of The Black Moon' (title of the month!) they have another traditional black metal song with a ferocious pace and harsh vocals and I guess they have saved the best song up to the end. This one is really a wild black metal hunt! This is pure darkness and evil from the beginning to the end, even the slow parts sound as malevolent as fuck. And as topping on this black metal cake they decided to cover 'Journey To The End' originally done by Windir which is kept quite close to the original and which shows again the combination of hate and fragility. Well done!

I guess this album is recommendable to everybody who likes traditional black metal and a hidden gem that wants to be discovered.

Thanks a lot to Greg from Godz Ov War who was so kind to send me the promo! Cheers!

Rating: 9 out of 10