Zeal and Ardor – Zeal and Ardor 2022

Upon hearing Zeal and Ardor for the first time, I declared them one of the most exciting new bands in heavy metal. Sporting a sound all their own, and a powerful backstory on their inception, their first two albums follow a story based on the idea that inspired the creation of the band…

What if African American Slaves Had Turned to Satan instead of God?

This idea infamously came from the suggestion of a racist online user to combine “black metal with n***** music”, but singer/guitarist/songwriter Manuel ran with it, using his anger as a driving force. After two albums, it became a question if this was going to be the only face of the project. But Manuel quickly denied those thoughts with an EP inspired by the murder of George Floyd.

Now, it is always unfortunate when a death is what sparks inspiration in an artist, but Manuel utilized his anger once again, and touched upon very important topics of inequality and injustice, not only current, but going back to the Tuskegee Experiments on black males. While following in the footsteps of his slavery inspired footsteps, modern topics required modern sounds, and it stepped away from the blues, gospel, and soul, towards an angrier, more metallic and industrial sound while still retaining those core elements. In a way, it freed the band up to refine their sound, and touch upon other topics and styles.

Musically, this is continued in the band’s recent self titled album. Lyrically, it continues the narrative of Devil is Fine and Stranger Fruit. It is about life after slavery. Life on the run. Most bands love to debut with a self titled album. And if they don’t, coming back to a self titled album later in their career can come across as a new era of the band, or just plain laziness. Luckily, in the case of Zeal and Ardor, it is definitely the former.

Manuel is no longer a solo artist. Zeal and Ardor is no longer a solo project. It is a full fledged band, and they come out on this album almost angrier than ever. Their namesake song works as an intro, but sets the mood very well. There’s no unnecessary waiting. Just pure build up to a huge one two punch, “Run” and “Death to the Holy”. These songs are packed with excellent riffs and vocal melodies. They’re catchy and heavy, and set the tone for the rest of the album.

“Emersion” slows things down, but in a beautiful way. Ambient, almost trip hop like at first, it has bursts of intensity similar to Deafheaven. “Golden Liar” has a wonderful western sound, inspired by the late great Ennio Morocone (The Good, The Bad and the Ugly), completing this slight dip in the album. Then it picks right back up with “Erase” and “Bow”, combining progressive, electronic, and industrial music with the groove inspired riffs and breakdowns we saw early on the album.

“Feed the Machine” takes the call and response style they are known for a feeds it through the industrial ringer. We see the strong Ministry and Nine Inch Nails sound through the keyboards and bass tones. “I Caught You” is the biggest surprise with its nu-metal, Korn and Deftones inspired feel. A standout track, and will become a standard for live sets I believe. “Church Burns” might sound the most like their previous two albums, but nestled in between so much aggression, it’s melodic sensibility feels nostalgic, and yet still so powerful.

“Götterdämmerung” is half sung in German and half in English, and feels so frantic after the previous track, but in a good way. According to Manuel, it was intentionally supposed to be a “bare bones song. No gimmicks, no frills, no distractions, just rage”. “Hold Your Head Low” on the other hand is an excellent track with dynamics, transitions, builds ups, climaxes, and was inspired by Opeth, also according to Manuel. This in all honesty could have been the proper album closer. I don’t feel like the last two tracks add much after this beauty.

The last two tracks are abbreviations. The first is “J-M-B”, which stands for “Jazz, Metal, Blues”, which is a good description. A quick two minute song with an upbeat riff that leads into its jazzy guitar solo. It’s problem is that it ends not long after becoming interesting, and feels like it could have been a part of another song. This is followed by “A-H-I-L“ which is just a keyboard driven instrumental outro. If it wasn’t blindsighted by “J-M-B”, it could have been a powerful finish after “Hold Your Head Low”, and “J-M-B” could have been a great bonus track or b-side.

That is a small gripe however in a 43 minute album that flies by so quickly. Zeal and Ardor are becoming an extremely consistent act and are slowly pushing themselves to dominate the genre with their forward thinking and deep understanding of all the music that has come before them. I don’t know if I’d say it’s the best album yet, but wouldn’t have any good arguments against anyone who did. The first thought I had upon hearing how aggressively they come out on the first few tracks was “Zeal and Ardor are hell bent for world domination”. Or at least to be a leading figure of heavy metal. And the way things are going, I have absolutely no problem with that.

Zeal and Ardor – Wake of a Nation EP (2020)

Like the previous two releases by the band, it’s hard to explain this new release by Zeal and Ardor without explaining how the band first got it’s start.

Manuel Gagneux would post on 4chan, asking people to combine two genres together. He would then make a song blending the two styles, as a challenge to himself. When someone posted black metal, and another posted n***** music, he could have gotten mad, but instead, he ran with it, and asked the question, “what if American slaves embraced Satan instead of Jesus?”.

The result was a song in 2013, a demo in 2014, and a full length in 2016.

Two albums later, Zeal and Ardor sounds like no other band. The heaviness, instrumentation, and darkness of black metal combined with the soul and power of negro spirituals, not to mention the influence of some industrial music. They were able to confront a part of history that wouldn’t feel right by almost any other metal band. And despite the racist parts of black metal brought in by NSBM bands (National Socialist Black Metal), Gagneux said there was a lot of similarities in the two styles fueled by rebellion.

But the year 2020, brought something else to the forefront, during the COVID 19 pandemic. While the world was in lockdown, the murder of George Floyd brought protests, civil unrest, and frustration. And while deaths of black people by the hands of white cops was something that had sparked controversy in the past, the lockdown and social media took it to heights it had never seen before. The world took notice, and protests happened everywhere.

Emanuel wrote a batch of songs in response to what he was seeing, and knew that it had to be its own thing. It wouldn’t fit with the new Zeal and Ardor material he was working on, and yet, Zeal and Ardor had to be the metal band to talk about it, like they were with slavery.

This become Wake of a Nation, and the artwork said it all; two police batons creating an inverted cross.

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The album starts with “Vigil”, and the piano ballad element sounds like a complete transformation before their quintessential sound comes in on the chorus. It does not hide, or shy away. It directly starts out:

You took all we had away
You’re quick to call it sick
But we’ve been damned to say
“I can’t breathe, it’s a cellphone
Please don’t shoot, I need to get home
I’m on my knees begging please”

So you’re just following orders
They just keep falling on us
How many more will it last?
Why not just take all of us?

Due to its intense nature, I can see this one becoming not only the favorite of this EP, but a standard in Zeal and Ardor setlists for years to come.

Next is “Tuskegee” which is about the infamous Syphilis Study from 1932 to 1972. 600 African American men were observed for untreated syphilis. 399 of them were diagnosed with it, but were never told what they really had (they were told they had “bad blood”), they were never treated despite syphilis becoming treatable by penicillin in 1947, they did not receive the free health care they were promised, and were given placebos and other ineffective treatments. They were never warned of the symptoms, or the fact that it could be spread to others. 128 of them died to complications, 40 wives had contacted it, and 19 children had it passed on to them.

You can see why this is such an angry song, compared to the sadness snd frustration of the first one, and we quickly see both sides of Zeal and Ardor’s arsenal. This contains some of the best black metal shrieks and low growls in the band’s short existence. It also ties to what we are currently seeing with vaccination rollout, as communities of color continue to struggle with trusting healthcare officials after so many instances like this one. An informative, and hard hitting song.

“At the Seams” keeps a steady rock beat as it goes back and forth between a two piano note ballad feel to it’s heavy black metal counterpart. The softer parts show the diversity of his singing voice with harmonies snd some nice lows. The heavy moments feel like the climax of a post rock song. It even has spoken German at the end saying:

“He told you he couldn’t breathe
For eight minutes
A scream in the dark”

Before letting out an appropriate bloodcurdling scream to finish the song.

“I Can’t Breathe” is a minute long interlude with real soundclips from protests, news reports, and cellphone footage on top of an industrial rhythm and some emotional wordless vocals. My only complaint is that it comes at a weird place, when I feel it would have had more effect at the beginning or end. This goes straight into:

“Trust No One”. Probably the most similar song to their past two releases, it has the call and response elements of the clean vocals, then switches to black metal, for the remainder of the song. It is sludgier than “Tuskegee”, and reminds me of Deafheaven, who must have rubbed off a bit on their tour a few years ago.

The final track is the title track, which sees the call and response at its most complex. This is all done over some NIN bass/keyboard tones, and is heavier than any song with hand claps should be. The layering is incredible, and again, it could have been a great opener, but is interestingly placed as the closer.

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My problems with the album are solely with the length and track order. Almost every song feels too short. Some could have benefited from another verse or chorus. Some could have benefited from an extra section. Some could have benefited from switching locations. But that said, every song brings something special to this release. They all could be done live and will enhance their already excellent live show. And maybe that’s where these songs will really flourish. But this EP as a whole leaves me wanting another song at least. The material is good and worthy of praise. And I’m sure there’s so much more that the band could have said.

I guess, as is the case with most EPs, it will hold us over until the next release. But I also think it was a very smart move to get it out as quickly as possible to be with the times as they were happening. It is a time stamp, and will always elicit emotions upon each re-listen, as we are transported back to the spring and summer of 2020.

I would love to see the band tackle more material like this, but even if they don’t, this was a powerful release, and one that shouldn’t be forgotten. We are fortunate that Zeal and Ardor took it up to themselves to say something for the metal community during these trying times, and release an album in the name of George Floyd, Eric Garner, Michael Brown, and so many others.