Another mysterious act taking inspiration from the ancients releasing under the banner of Snow Wolf Records, Telesterion’s massive debut makes waves with its methodical song writing, massively heavy riffs, and mysterious atmosphere makes for an extremely memorable release for this year. Much of the album is based around the Greek Eleusinian Mysteries. What’s great is just how well they nailed the mysterious nature of said mysteries within the music its self fusing post-rock, doom, and airy ambient production to create an ode to the ancients.
Starting out, the instrumentation is done well. There are some memorable guitar riffs that have an extremely satisfying progression. The whole album has this sense of a journey to it, much like the rites of the Eleusinian mysteries that each track is named after, they all stand on their own as their own rite, but as a whole create the entire ceremony. Thanks to the songwriting, all of this flows seamlessly and really hypnotizes you with its music. The trance like guitars are only helped by the powerful drums and heavy bass. Throw in some echoed chanting and harmonic clashes between riffs and you got your self a nice little EP right here.
I find this debut to be very strong and shows a lot of potential for the band moving forward, but I am torn on the style of production here. Its airy and rather lofi nature gives this album a rather foggy sound. Almost sounding like a dusty record at times. On one hand, I feel like it adds to the atmosphere the release builds. Mysterious and ancient, like discovering and hearing the sounds of the ceremony straight from the ancients themselves. But on the other hand, I do feel like it draws back the rather amazing instrumentation work going on. Particularly on the drums, they get almost lost at times thanks to the rough production, but they certainly do benefit the guitars, like on the heavy and almost shoegaze third track Things Said. But at the end of the day, I do think the instrumentation powers through and just saves the album as a whole for me personally. Something that I think has a very wide appeal and can be both a uplifting and triumphant, but at the same time still hold a dark and haunting angst that makes it feel whole. Highly recommend giving this a listen.