METALLIAN - Benighted

Psychose - 2002 - Adipocere
ICP - 2003 - Adipocere
Identisick - 2006 - Adipocere
Icon - 2007 - Osmose
Asylum Cave - 2011 - Season Of Mist
Carnivore Sublime - 2014 - Season Of Mist
Brutalive The Sick - 2015 - Season Of Mist
Necrobreed – 2017 - Season Of Mist
Obscene Repressed – 2020 – Season Of Mist
Ekbom - 2024 - Season Of Mist

Members

Vocals

Dishumanised,Néfastes>>JULIEN TRUCHAN>>Néfastes

Guitar

Dishumanised>>Olivier Gabriel>>Néfastes, Trauma, Warside - Darkness Fire>>Liem N’guyen>>Néfastes - Adrien Guerin>>Doorsfall, F Stands For Fuck You - Horgoth, Deficience, Furax>>EMMANUEL DALLE>>Deficience – Yyrkoon, Decline Of Humanity, Carnival in Coal, We All Die (Laughing), Drowning, Ashura, Infected Society, Freitot>>Fabien "Fack" Desgardins>>Infected Society, Freitot

Bass

Remy Aubrespin - Whisper-X, Silly Twats, For Many Reasons>>Eric Lombard>>For Many Reasons - Winds Of Torment, Aabsinthe>>PIERRE ARNOUX>>Aabsinthe

Drum

Darkness Fire>>Fred Fayolle>>Osgiliath, Résilience – White Card, Burning Skies, Doorsfall, F Stands For Fuck You, Sepultura, Mumakil, Necrovile, Arkhan, Disavowed, Abbath>>Kevin Foley>>Disavowed, F Stands For Fuck You, Sepultura, Arkhan, Mumakil, Necrovile, Abbath, Get The Shot, Lofofora, Nostromo, One Life All-In, Hjelvik – Dead Talking Mind, Deadly Sins, Svart Crown, The Seven Gates, Death Lab, The Arisen, Mithridatic, Agressor, Gorsed Noctis, Serocs, Aronious, Ne Obliviscaris, Nader Sadek>>KÉVIN PARADIS>>Death Lab, The Arisen, Mithridatic, Agressor, Gorsed Noctis, Serocs, Aronious, Ne Obliviscaris, Nader Sadek

History & Biography

The Frenchmen came together in May, 1998 with members from Darkness Fire, Osgiliath and Dishumanised. An independent and self-titled album was recorded and released in 2000 with help from producer Alain Guerci. The Saint Etienne-based band was soon identified as a death/black act. Benighted next signed to Adipocere Records in January of 2001, the first result of which was the Psychose album. Dates with Destinity preceded the release. Further shows with Rain and Carcariass followed. 2003's ICP is short for Insane Cephalic Production. This album was recorded in Germany. Bassist Remi quit the band in late 2003 and was soon replaced.

Identisick was the last album for Adipocere and was released in 2006. That was also the year Fred Fayolle left the band to work exclusively with Osgiliath. The group signed with Osmose Productions and issued Icon in October of 2007.

Season Of Mist signed death metal band Benighted in 2010. The tentative release date of the band's sixth album was set for April 18th. Benighted would release a new album, Asylum Cave, on March 21st in Europe and March 29th in North America through Season Of Mist. In 2012, French band Benighted filmed a video for the song Let The Blood Spill Between My Broken Teeth, which was taken from the group’s last album, Asylum Cave. The band was touring Europe all spring. Benighted named its 2014 album Carnivore Sublime. The French band’s seventh full-length would hit the stores on February 14th. Benighted revealed that its previously announced live album in celebration of the band's fifteenth anniversary would be entitled Brutalive The Sick and would be released on the 23rd of February, 2015. Heidelberg Deathfest or HDDF 2018 – Part III chose the slogan “Support Your Local Death!” and took place on the 24th of March in that city. Among others Asphyx, Milking The Goatmachine and Benighted were appearing. Arnoux took up the guitar on stage in 2017. Kévin Paradis joined on drums in 2017, but he was just a nomad who would jump from band to band on a monthly basis. He had appeared with the band in 2014 as well. Benighted’s 2018 EP Dogs Always Bite Harder Than Their Master was slated for release through Season Of Mist on October 12th. Fred Fayolle died in 2019. The France-based death metal outfit entered the studio for the recording of a new album, called Obscene Repressed, in 2019 which was to be released through Season Of Mist in 2020. Benighted was to support Aborted on the Hell Over Europe 4 tour in September and October 2021. Guitarist Fabien Desgardins exited in 2022.

Archspire, Benighted, Psycroptic and Entheos announced a tour of Europe for March 2023. Vacation House Recordings reissued Necrobreed on LP. The package was issued in a limited edition of 300. Benighted issued a record called Ekbom through Season Of Mist on April 12th 2024. It was recorded at Kohlekeller Studio in Germany. Baest was embarking on its Beast Against Beast European co-headline tour together with Benighted in the autumn of 2024. Opening was to be Coffin Feeder. The band, alongside acts like Candlemass, Emperor, Flotsam And Jetsam and Stratovarius, was booked for 70000 Tons Of Metal 2025 and Summer Breeze 2025.

Singer Julien Truchan is not a kangaroo like Kevin Paradis or Kevin Foley hopping from pay cheque to pay cheque, but he is working his way up to Björn "Speed" Strid levels in terms of being available for recording guest slots for everybody.

Reviews

BENIGHTED - ICON - OSMOSE
Icon is Benighted’s first album for Osmose Productions and one would be remiss to say it provides much beyond put-your-head-down and deliver brutal death metal and grindcore. The mix of screamed and growled vocals which nonetheless occasionally comes across as easily comprehensible, speedy and heavy brutal riffing and blasting drums is performed competently and with conviction, yet is hardly revolutionary or unique on Icon.
Songs like Compete Exsanguination (Carcass, eat your heart out), Slut, Grind Wit, Smile Then Bleed or Invoxhate are brutal odes to the extremity of the band and at times. The band’s performance does take the odd turn here and there however. Slut throws in a pseudo-industrial moment. Grind Wit has the audacity to throw in a hip-hop interlude, while the listener has to wait almost until the end of the album to hear the guitarist can actually solo. The end of the album is also the where the better songs, like Invoxhate and Blindfolded Centuries, reside. Oddly enough, the title track of this grind opus is the thrashiest song on record. Even odder - or perhaps not given how often this has been going on in France for twenty years without anyone there learning anything - is how the label’s biography for the band calls the group 'trash.'
Icon is a damn heavy album that nonetheless proposes little variation on the theme aside from the mistaken extraneous influences mentioned. The concept album might fare better when heard with lyrics in hand. - Ali “The Metallian”

Interviews

Benighted