Review by Vinny for Doedsvangr - Within the Flesh (2026)

2026 was shaping up to be a sparse year on the black metal listening front.  After an exhausting 2025, keeping up with as many new releases as I could in black metal, I decided that 2026 would be a leaner year by all accounts.  In a month that has seen me purchase the new Mork album for my collection, it was not long before I could feel that familiar chill in my bones that could only be tempered by more chilling black metal music.  As my bm rotation began to grow, I soon found the international supergroup, Doedsvangr in front of me with their third album, Within Flesh.  Now, I must confess that I did not take an immediate shine to this record.  As my first foray into the band’s music, I was not feeling the vocals at all.  The spoken word aspect of them at first came across as sounding a bit dreary and dull as opposed to menacing.  Yet, soon enough, it was clear that the vocals are all part of the ravishing grimness of the record.  In fact, I would go as far to say that there are not many other styles of vocals that could outdo these in all honesty.

The real resplendent qualities of the record lie in those urgent tremolo riffs that dominate tracks such as ‘Omnipath’, or in those drums that appear straight forward in the first instance but are actually hitting some interesting patterns.  Then there’s the looming menace of ‘Blodskam’ with those spine-chilling choral keys that create atmosphere galore in the background.  Then I realised that this is the real sweet-spot for those vocals as they work like recitals of incantations that when uttered in the correct dialect can bring forth the darkest of evil from beyond.

Then artwork may possess some disappointment (incidentally the artwork clearly references the opening track on the record, ‘Devil Bites Man) but there’s very little of that spreading into the record it is pleasing to note.  Within Flesh has a fully formed sound to it.  One that I would expect to hear from a collective of such seasoned pro’s such as Shatraug, Sanrabb and Doedsadmiral.  It is a shame that I have no knowledge of prior releases to benchmark this one against.  As such it is able to be rated entirely off the back of its merits as a standalone record and is one that shows that when done correctly (most importantly by the correct people), black metal doesn’t have to be warped, combined with other styles or dumbed down by sterilising melodies to be effective.