Aluk Todolo is one of the 21st century's best French instrumental art-metal bands. Its 2007 debut album, Descension, has been described by the band’s members as “occult rock,” though the opening eight-and-a-half-minute composition “Obedience” reveals that there's much more going on here. It starts with a darkened, post-goth ambience of disturbing noise before exploding into a maelstrom of roaring black metal guitars and krautrock-inspired repetition. Guitarist Shantidus Riedacker segues between quavering tremolo and squalling feedback on the plodding “Burial Ground” as the versatile rhythm section exercises so much restraint that at times it’s hard to believe they’re the same two guys who also play in the black metal ensemble Diamatregon. Over similarly foreboding death-march rhythms, dense layers of feedback hiss and howl, making “Woodchurch” the album’s track most likely to be admired by My Bloody Valentine’s Kevin Shields. But it’s the closing tack, “Disease,” where Riedacker lets loose fuzzed-out slide guitar before a sludgy blues riff slowly emerges from the tar pits like a brontosaurus brought back to life.