Öxxö Xööx, the unique French avant-garde / experimental doom metal unit, have released new single ‘Döld’, the second track taken from their upcoming album, Ÿ, which will be released on 29th November via Blood Music.
Premiered via Heavy Blog Is Heavy, listen to ‘Döld’ here:
Featuring the songwriting, instrumentation and vocals of the titular Öxxö Xööx (Laurent Lunoir, ex-Whourkr), the operatic treasure Rïcïnn [Laure Le Prunenec of Corpo-Mente and Igorrr], and live drummer Isarnos (Thomas Jacquelin), Ÿ also sees guest synth guitar processing by cyber metal star Master Boot Record.
Ÿ opens with the solemn dirge of what sounds like a funeral. Dripping with beauty and melancholic doom, it gives way to bell-like organs before plodding drums build to a gothic assault. The album continues to shift rapidly from gorgeous, haunting laments to utter desperation and unhinged mania as the 78 minute journey spirals deeper and deeper into the maze of its own machinations and enigmas.
Laurent comments,“Ÿ is a very symbolic album. There are several meanings regarding its name: First of all, the umlauts symbolise the duality of our material universe. Ÿ is a two-headed “I”, having two directions. It’s the symbol of the choice between the path of light and the path of darkness, between vice and virtue. By its tree-like shape, it reflects human growth, whose branches rise to heavens. Ÿ symbolises the three-dimensional space (the orthonormal coordinate system x, y, z). It also depicts the corner of a cube (symbol of the earth, the stability, the hardness of the material world). “Y” can also depict the bifid tongue of the snake; the crossroad; the “Y” generation; the simplified shape of the female internal genital tract, as well as the Y chromosome in the male; the Christ (Y) on the cross (T).”
The brainchild of Laurent Lunoir, Öxxö Xööx acts as a personal artistic project outside of Igorrr where he can realise his dreams entirely unrestricted. In doing so, he attempts to raise his “being”; a kind of inner “holy war” to find what religions call “God” (and which he refers to as “Light”) in a personal way, without adhering to any religious practice. This expresses what he feels toward the material reality in which we must live. To achieve this he enlisted the help of artists who share a similar creative outlook, those whom Laurent feels a “connection” to the Light, such as Rïcïnn (Laure Le Prunenec) and Isarnos (Thomas Jacquelin). The possibility remains open for other collaborations in the future which will allow the Öxxö Xööx universe to grow even further.
Ÿ comes out on 29thNovember via Blood Music and can be pre-ordered here.