Mixing metal with non-metal genres is a practice as old as metal itself. But most such mixtures come about between jolly bedfellows. Folk music, orchestras, and various subgenres of rock don’t evoke clashing sounds or ideologies with the heavy and distorted. When the combination is less peanut butter & jelly and more peanut butter & sardines, is when critics look up, and oftentimes, audiences look away. We’ve had artists that mix metal with chamber music (Anareta), hip-hop (all of nu-metal), reggae (Skindred), even acoustic swing-jazz adjacent slam poetry (Dronte). But Contemplation is the first band I’ve come across that attempts to marry doom-death metal and dub, a niche genre that originated around 1970 from remixed reggae and psychedelics. Is life possible for this Frankensteinian creation, or should Au Bord du Précipice be expelled with torches and pitchforks?
Contemplation is the baby of Matthieu Ducheine, who writes everything, plays all the instruments, sings, mixes, produces, handles promos, cooks, cleans, and does the laundry. This would be an undertaking when not solving the musical equivalent of a unified field theory, but apparently he likes impossible challenges. Because Contemplation works. Doom-death is a clever choice to merge with dub; they have similar pacing and share a certain sense of meditative contemplation. Point to Ducheine for picking an apt moniker. He demonstrates many ways to mix the styles successfully across Au Bord du Précipice, and the most prominent is an unexpected third disparate element: the violin. Its lush and ethereal sound functions as an important binding agent, and Ducheine is clearly a master, employing everything from thrilling trills to fragile held notes to complex melodic dashes across the scales.
Au bord du précipice by contemplation
If all the focus had been on the odd combination, Au Bord du Précipice would have likely remained little more than an interesting gimmick, but the pieces receive as much attention as the whole. Strip out the atmospheric passages and the dub, and the remainder would still be a very solid doom-death album. “Endless Mental Slavery” locks in with a great pounding riff that receives embellishments from every corner throughout the track. After a shimmering violin intro, “Réminiscence Ancestrale” settles into a heavy swinging riff reminiscent of Usurpress with an energetic hammered solo to boot. Ducheine’s growl is more limited than his instrumental prowess, but its cavernous quality helps add a little extra weight. Though there are stretches that get a little overstretched, and some of the more experimental elements don’t always hit the mark (such as the odd vocoded humming on “Le Recours Aux Montagnes”), Contemplation does a great job keeping it interesting.
I can’t properly comment on the quality of the dub side of the moon,1 but the range of ways the psychedelic echoing chords and beats are used is like walking through a gallery of musical inspiration. The atmospheric stretches revolve around the interplay between the dub and the violin, but even when the thunder rolls in, well-chosen snare hits and string plucks roll away with the same wide reverb, bridging the gap and increasing the cohesion between the poles. Contemplation is fully produced by Ducheine himself, a fact he is deservedly proud of. The mix is balanced, the attention to detail meticulous, and the master warm and inviting.
Clearly, Ducheine is a man of many talents, diverse interests, and a metric fuckton of sheer goddamn conviction to pull off a project like this. Because I’ve been listening to metal for over two decades, but none of it sounded quite like Au Bord du Précipice. The dub inflicts a laidback attitude that persists even through double bass drums and bellowing roars. This is death-adjacent metal you can sink into the pillows with, and once you’re there, you get treated to beautiful violins from the top of a forested hill. Something this experimental won’t always work, and there are bits and pieces that feel off. But how well Contemplation works anyway is a testament to a very creative mind, and I dearly hope Ducheine will continue to develop this remarkable project.
Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: PCM
Label: Self-released
Website: metalcontemplation.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: March 21st, 2025
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