(written by Islander)
Oskoreien is back!
For people with discerning musical tastes and long memories, that will be a very happy piece of news. For people who may be encountering the Oskoreien name for the first time, it’s a project formed in Los Angeles in 2003 by multi-instrumentalist Jay Valena. As his solo endeavor, Oskoreien released a pair of demos and then a self-titled debut album in 2011, followed by a split with Botanist five years later and then a second album, All Too Human, in 2016 — but nothing since then.
If you haven’t explored those previous releases, they are well worth your time, especially if you’re a fan of multi-faceted melodic black metal (and you can learn more about some of them, and about Jay Valena‘s very interesting inspirations, through the reviews and an interview we published in those earlier years). Oskoreien‘s forthcoming third album, Hollow Fangs, will also be well worth your time. It’s set for release on July 18th, and today we’re premiering its opening track “Prismatic Reason“.
On the new album Valena is joined by Rashid Nadjib on guitars, and by bassist Matthew Durkee. Valena describes it as “an intensely personal album borne of severance and survival – a visceral exploration for meaning in the wake of a near-death experience, of love twisted by personality disorder, and of family shattered by schizophrenia and suicide.” It “provides a cathartic voice of recognition and understanding of this pain in its incisive fury and splendor.”
The album consists of five songs, each of them in the 7-9 minute range. As the opener, “Prismatic Reason” powerfully seizes attention in a multitude of ways, all of them breathtaking.
After a brief and momentous fanfare, the music surges forward with hammering drums, feverish bass tones, and roiling storms of fiery riffage, fronted by deep, jagged growls and a hair-raising scream. After that explosive start, the drums steady and the rippling fretwork layers (both caustic and clear) begin to roll in waves, displaying a different and more beleaguered measure of torment.
And the music does sound tormented, like a panorama of pain that burns from the inside out. A slowly wailing guitar solo surfaces in the midst of those expansive and engulfing sensations, and it adds feelings of grief. A second solo arises as well, glorious but also tragic.
The pacing continually surges and recedes as the riffing changes, and further soloing fluidly ascends in piercing fashion, as if expressing intense yearning for relief from harrowing experiences. Near the end, the riffing begins to fervently throb, paving the way to perhaps the most extravagant solo of them all, and everything comes together in a closing crescendo that’s uplifting, resilient, even hopeful.
This one song alone, a completely captivating emotional powerhouse, justifies Oskoreien‘s description of the album as a visceral exploration of traumatic pain, and as “a cathartic voice of recognition and understanding of this pain in its incisive fury and splendor.”
CREDITS:
All music by Jay Valena and Rashid Nadjib
Jay Valena – Vocals, lead & rhythm guitar, drum programming, synthesizer
Rashid Nadjib – Rhythm guitar
Matthew Durkee – Bass
TRACK LIST:
1. Prismatic Reason
2. Bernalillo Sunrise
3. Psychotiscism
4. Fragments
5. To Kiss the Viper’s Fang
Hollow Fangs was produced by Jay Valena and Rashid Nadjib, and was recorded, engineered, and mixed by Jay Valena in Los Angeles, CA during 2024-25. It was mastered by Jack Shirley at Atomic Garden Studios. Cover photo and art design by Jay Valena, stained glass by Williams Burges, Cardiff Castle, Wales.
The album is available for digital pre-order now, and can also be pre-saved on Spotify. We will have more to say about the album as a whole in due course.
PRE-ORDER:
https://oskoreien.bandcamp.com/album/hollow-fangs
PRE-SAVE (Spotify):
https://recordu.lnk.to/Hollow_Fangs
SOCIAL MEDIA:
https://www.facebook.com/oskoreienband
https://www.instagram.com/oskoreien