When it comes to naming a current great Metal band from France most Metal fans will cite Gojira.  I’ve just listened to Eryn Non Dae – Hydra Lernaia and its melodramatic dark atmosphere has really made an impact on me. It’s albums like these that have the power to push you intro a trance-like state that really deserve attention. It reminds me of Isis’s Oceanic meeting some of Tools more atmospheric tracks but with a more sinister edge.

This album’s concept is based around the Greek Mythology of Hydra Lernaia, a gigantic nine-headed serpent which haunted the swamps of Lerna. Hercules was sent to destroy it as one of his 12 labours. Everytime he decapitated one of it’s heads two new heads grew in its place. With the help of Iolaos he cauterized the wounds preventing further growth. The band say the album “Hydra Lernaia explores nine human feelings as many sided problems that present new difficulties each time one aspect of them seems to be solved or overcome. Each song is a feeling; each feeling is an incurable disease that tortures the heart of man”

The album is haunting with its guitars, mesmerizingly tribal in its rhythm and its vocals create a sinister atmosphere of overwhelming feelings that cannot be tamed. This is a place where the emotion mind rules and the only way to overcome the destructive forces is to sink into then and battle  until they are tamed. The end of the album gives a sence that the battle will always rage on but a sense of strength emerges that by confronting this nine headed serpent of feelings you become a stronger person.

Concept albums kick ass!! Eryn Non Dae’s Hydra Lernaia is as gigantic as the nine-headed serpent that the album is named after.

Below is an image I found of an artefact dated 525BC that is held at  the J Paul Getty Museum in the US  of Hercules battling Hydra Lernaia (Click HERE or on the image to read more about the greek Mythology of Hydra Lernaia)

Album reviews are out of 5