Vvilderness - Dark Waters (2020)^{Release ID: 15946}

An early taste of atmospheric black metal / blackgaze in 2020 with a solo Hungarian artist who doesn’t mind adding in some folk elements along the way. I think that this album has some very interesting ideas associated with it, but the execution of those ideas hold this album back from greatness.

For starters, the poetry on this album is wonderful. I am a really big fan of the word painting and general ambiguity of the lyrics, which leave the door open for plenty of interpretation. The song “Havasok / Snowy Mountains” goes so far as to borrow from Hungarian folklore and becomes very regional. It’s pretty cool to hear. “Danu’s Tears”, “Mist Pillars ‘19” and “Dark Waters” all follow suit with some great storytelling.

The production on this album is pretty hit or miss. For one, the incorporation of traditional Hungarian instruments is used very well on the second half of this album, especially with the bagpipes on the atmospheric, instrumental closer “Wilderness”. Beyond that, the vocalist, which is very far in the back of the mix, could have been given a lot more presence given what I mentioned earlier about this albums poetry.

The general sound of this album however is… not good. The guitars are way too compressed for this style of music and the bass gets the short end of the stick because of it. The softer sections on tracks like “Mist Pillars ‘19” and “Havasok / Snowy Mountains” sound great, but the clean / acoustic guitars are louder than the distorted, heavier stuff.

This album does deserve a better fate. This kind of folk metal that is literally based off of Hungarian folklore should be right up my alley, but is held back considerably by its lackluster production. If this sounded better, it could have been great. As it is, Dark Waters is decent, but it could have been made better by some chlorine.