{"id":529839,"date":"2026-04-14T06:12:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-14T06:12:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/529839\/"},"modified":"2026-04-14T06:12:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-14T06:12:11","slug":"leila-abdul-rauf-andros-insidium-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/529839\/","title":{"rendered":"Leila Abdul-Rauf – Andros Insidium Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"You may not recognize her name if you don\u2019t follow her solo work, but Leila Abdul-Rauf is an experienced metal musician. As vocalist and guitarist in death metal group Vastum, and semi-frequent collaborator with other extreme and unconventional artists like Dream Unending, she is something of a veteran on 20 Buck Spin. Yet it is only now, with Andros Insidium, that her eponymous solo project sees a release on this label, and the change is more than symbolic. Whilst staying within the realms of experimental dark ambience\u2014and retaining her signature trumpet\u2014the music has taken a decisively heavier turn as Leila dials up the oppressive drone, shapes instrumental elements into dissonant, strange patterns, and incorporates vicious, harsh vocals. And if the cover isn\u2019t clue enough, she seems to have something to say.<\/p>\n

Andros Insidium is a ritual of sorts, but an allegorical one. Leila uses the goddess Ishtar, specifically her fabled descent into and ascent out of the underworld, as a vessel to explore womanhood in general. Mythology and ceremony act as a framework to \u201cexorcise\u201d demons of patriarchy and the feminine rage that riles against them. Anger reaches an apex in harrowing \u201cAndros Insidium\u201d where Leila condemns \u201cyou\u201d (man) in a chorus of haunting half-sung chants, whispers, and snarls for continually assaulting and torturing \u201cher\u201d (woman). Though superficially dissimilar, it vividly recalls a Caligula-era Lingua Ignota with its minimalist piano and cold narration that becomes screams. This is the first appearance of these gargling, screamed vocals on the record, and one of only two songs that include them, the other being closer \u201cReturn to Anu.\u201d The time leading up to this release is filled with tension, the ambience smothering the soundscape without reprieve, as eerie plucks and unsettling cleans undulate through it to the beat of portentous drums and tambourine\u2014a bit like an alternate-universe Swans, though sometimes randomly reminiscent of Haunted Plasma (\u201cStripped Before the Eye of Death,\u201d \u201cReturn to Anu\u201d).<\/p>\n

\ufeffAndros Insidium by Leila Abdul-Rauf<\/a><\/p>\n

Andros Insiduim is out to make its listener uncomfortable, and it unequivocally succeeds. Just about every element from the ritualistic drum patterns, strange melodies from synth, trumpet, and string, and omnipresent thousand-ton drone sets you on edge. The clanging of steel drums that open the album, and return only in the final track, immediately puts the listener on edge. But it\u2019s Leila\u2019s variously dramatic, baleful, and cold\u2014often multitracked\u2014vocals (\u201cStripped Before the Eye of Death,\u201d \u201cFractured Body\u201d)\u2014and the lyrics they deliver\u2014that pulls these feelings of unease into full potency. As a powerless witness (\u201cStripped\u2026,\u201d \u201cA Requiem\u2026\u201d), a prophetess (\u201cFractured Body,\u201d \u201cReturn to Anu\u201d), or a divine judge (\u201cAndros Insidium\u201d), her accented intonations give her the air of a haunted narrator; and the very dissonance of the vocal lines seems to emphasise their unflinchingly dark lyrical content more than more traditionally mournful melodies could. The sparse use of harsh vocals enhances their viciousness, and their final appearance occurs in a passage that mimics their first\u2014with the same piano tritones and drumbeat\u2014reinforcing their importance both emotionally and musically. In all, it can be a viscerally disturbing experience.<\/p>\n

\"\"Yet Andros Insidium also has some groovy and even beautiful moments. \u201cEros Anima\u201d centres a bizarrely catchy rhythm with its menagerie of hand percussion, trumpet, and guitar, while \u201cA Requiem for Ishtar\u201d sees weeping strings accompany angelic sopranos in a genuinely sad lament, and opener \u201cDescent into Kur\u201d consists of mostly harmonious, if ominous, synth melodies. In the context of the whole, however, such occasions are barely less unsettling than the dissonance and only throw those harsher, uglier moments into sharper relief. You could argue they make the music harder to listen to than if they were entirely absent, and the whole thing were obscure and confrontational. Nothing here feels truly random or needless, particularly when one treats it like the story it is and listens actively. But without devoting your full attention, some of the more esoteric aspects tend to jump out at you awkwardly\u2014the announcing trumpets and didgeridoo-like male drones in \u201cSenex Rule,\u201d or the skin-crawling unfolding of \u201cAndros Insidium,\u201d for example.<\/p>\n

As with much avant-garde music, your ability to go on the journey of Andros Insidium will depend on your tolerance for weirdness and willingness to feel uncomfortable. In executing her ritual of catharsis, Leila Abdul-Rauf indulges no sentiment but her own\u2014par for the course with extreme metal perhaps, but in this medium, the risk of alienation could be higher. Nevertheless, this is a striking work that deserves at least an open-minded explore.<\/p>\n

Rating: Good
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: 20 Buck Spin<\/a>
Websites: Bandcamp<\/a> | Facebook<\/a>
Releases Worldwide: April 17th, 2026<\/p>\n

\n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"You may not recognize her name if you don\u2019t follow her solo work, but Leila Abdul-Rauf is an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":529840,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[183552,47816,6446,93867,6447,183553,178402,183554,22556,39187,96,56239,183555,183556,104765,128,263,129,149193,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-529839","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-20-buck-spin","9":"tag-47816","10":"tag-3-0","11":"tag-ambient","12":"tag-american-metal","13":"tag-andros-insidium","14":"tag-apr26","15":"tag-dark-ambient","16":"tag-drone","17":"tag-electronic-metal","18":"tag-entertainment","19":"tag-experimental-metal","20":"tag-haunted-plasma","21":"tag-leila-abdul-rauf","22":"tag-lingua-ignota","23":"tag-music","24":"tag-review","25":"tag-reviews","26":"tag-swans","27":"tag-uk","28":"tag-united-kingdom","29":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=529839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/529839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/529840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=529839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=529839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=529839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}