Sonny's Reviews
ItCoS' fourth full-length is an album of groovy, doomy sludge metal that dabbles in a number of other genres to add a bit of variation, such as the Raining Blood-style thrash riff at the end of ten-minute opener The Fool's Journey, the southern-rock / country influence on The Chasm at the Mouth of the All and the acoustic rock of closing track Prima Materia. The heavy sludge base is suitably dense with thick, cloying riffs and the other influences are integrated well. My chief reservation is with the vocals. There's nothing really wrong with them really, they just don't appeal to me all that much, except on the aforementioned Prima Materia where they are less earnest and more relaxed.
I love Cardinal Wyrm - they are one of the great underappreciated doom metal bands operating currently and I have been a massive supporter of theirs since their early days This, their fourth album, however, is a bit of a letdown and may well be the first of their albums I don't purchase a physical copy of. In an attenpt to expand their sound and stretch out, they have released an album that is certainly more ambitious compositionally, but has ended up sounding a bit confused and less focussed. It's not terrible by any means and tracks like Canticle and Abbess kick all kinds of ass and retain plenty of their bombastic doom sound, but it just doesn't maintain momentum and wanders a bit, especially early on. Not a disaster by any means, but a step down from previous releases. Pity, I was really looking forward to this one.
Atavist are a Mancunian death doom band, formed by Winterfylleth's Chris Naughton, who reformed in 2016 after being on hiatus since 2007. Their latest full-length and first since reforming, contains four lengthy tracks totalling a runtime of 58 minutes of funeral doom-inflected death metal. Opener, Loss, begins in a wistfully melancholic way with a guitar strumming away gently before being joined by a violin, possibly the most mournful-sounding and much-underused weapon in any potential doom metal arsenal. Of course, the weight is increased when the band kick in with some crushing chords and Matt Bartley howls of his unfathomable loss, only to return to gentle melancholy as the violin refrain takes over once more. This contrast between the wistful introspection of the gentler sections, whether expressed via lone strummed guitar, violin or piano and the heavier, angrier doom-laden sections is what lies at the heart of the track and is handled superbly as the emotional resonance rises and falls over the whole sixteen and a half minutes.
Second track, Struggle, is unremittingly grim with suitably weighty riffs, the contrasts in mood here expressed via the tracks' tempos which vary from slow to spine-crawlingly ultra-slow. Self-realisation opens with a riff that anyone who is familiar with Chris Naughton's work in Winterfylleth should recognise, the black metal style of the riff is offset by the plodding drumwork for a menacingly effective atmosphere as Matt Bartley unleashes a black metal-inspired howl. The track then grinds to a funereal crawl after a few minutes as the doom-laden depression reasserts it control over the proceedings.
Final track, Absolution, is the albums longest and is the album's catharsis, sounding less desperate and almost as if there is some kind of light at the end of the tunnel. Even though the tempo is still slow, the guitar melody overlaying the track sounds almost hopeful and despite a certain deep-grained melancholy, the track gives the album a somewhat upbeat finale.
Yatra's second album of the year is basically a classic stoner doom/heavy metal hybrid that sounds more extreme than it is due to guitarist/vocalist Dana Helmuth's blackened shrieking vocal delivery. Don't be fooled, this isn't blackened doom that sounds like the doors to hell have opened, it is more old-school metal than that, One for the Mountain even has a bluesy groove going on! It's still mighty heavy though and a damn good listen.
Carrying on the stellar work from 2015's The Dreaming I, Naas Alcameth (aka Kyle Spanswick) has produced another album of challenging, yet still immensely listenable, atmospheric black metal. Compositionally exceptional and atmospherically menacing, this is exactly the kind of modern black metal I enjoy the most. Ambient passages in BM albums usually provide some respite from the blasting, but here they just serve to ramp up the menace to even higher levels - for proof hear how Succubare builds the demonic haunting vibe up until all hell is let loose on Ephialtes. The blasting, such as on standout Pnigalion, takes the (demonic) form of huge, great walls of sound that you don't merely listen to - they invade your ears and swarm your brain like the infestation of flies in The Amityville Horror that so put the shits up Rod Steiger! For me the only album that has created a comparable, albeit very different, black metal atmosphere this year is Paysage d'Hiver's Im Wald and that is pretty good company to be in I can assure you. In common with The Dreaming I this also has one scary-looking cover that perfectly illustrates what you are about to hear within the enclosed grooves and the overall package is a superb exercise in creating a great horror movie experience in music form.
As a proviso, I know and understand that their are ideological questions surrounding the beliefs of Akhlys and I get it that people are turned off their music as a result, but this is often the case in black metal and I have learned to separate artist from art so this is purely a judgement based on the music alone.
Firstly, I was drawn to this after seeing the cover on the homepage and decided to give it a spin, so thanks to you Ben for adding it when you did.
This 2018 album was CHRCH's second full-length album and, for me, a step up from their still impressive debut. One of the most striking strengths of CHRCH's music is the simplicity of the melodies and I don't mean that in a negative way. Despite the lack of complexity they are delivered in such a way that the effect is shattering. The opener, the twenty-minute "Infinite Return" for example, begins with a really simple melody picked out by guitar with very little distortion to produce a beautifully clear sound, accompanied by Eva Rose's clean-sung vocals for a gorgeous, calm opening that we all know just can't last. As guitar and vocals are joined by the drums, beating out a distant-sounding militaristic tattoo, the ominous atmosphere builds like gathering thunderheads. The guitar becomes increasingly insistent as the vocals get more desperate-sounding until the storm hits around the seven-minute mark and the riff crushes all before it as Eva shrieks and snarls and the drums hit the fore like a seven-pound sledgehammer. Around the midway point the maelstrom passes and a similar, but more hesitant-sounding, melody to the one at the beginning of the track is picked out and the calm returns, albeit now with a lost innocence as notes of dissonance insert themselves into this gentle refrain. This too cannot last and another, albeit more triumphal and anthemic, crescendo is reached, as if the victims of the first have now become the perpetrators of this second atrocity. What an opening twenty minutes - possibly one of my favourite slabs of doom metal ever - and a real high mark for the rest of the album to follow.
Second track Portals weighs in around the fifteen minute mark and kicks off with a weighty riff from the outset, but despite this it manages to become increasingly heavy as the track buids, filling all available space and threatening to collapse under it's own weight. Again this main riff is quite simple, but is deployed in such a way that it seems to be more complex than it actually is as the listener's mind grapples with the crushing weight of it. The vocals once more run the whole gamut from ethereal and angelic to savage and demonic. The soaring, distorted guitar solo towards the end of the track feels like the Comfortably Numb solo being torn apart and destroyed by the mass of an errant supermassive black hole. Final track Aether is the shortest at nine and a half minutes and has a riff and tone that sounds remarkably like Warning's Watching From A Distance album, at least until the last couple of minutes anyway, which are just utter madness as everything must go before album's end! Before concluding I must make mention of Adam Jennings drums, they sound phenomenal and as good as any doom drum performance I can recall. In fact, the production as a whole is superb and is a major factor in the success of the album.
This has jumped right in as one of my absolute favourite doom albums. To use a sporting analogy, it sounds like an album where the band have "left everything on the field" and absolutely given it everything. If I had any criticism at all it would be very minor - with the epic Infinite Return up front, the rest of the album is overshadowed slightly. I would have liked to hear the running order of Portals; Aether and closing with Infinite Return ending the album with a real triumph. FFO Sub Rosa, Warning, Pallbearer and any "no fucks to give" doomhead. If you have any love at all for real doom metal then you need this album.
L.A. three-piece Merciless Death were part of the 2000's thrash revival and this was their debut album. Originally self-released it was reissued with much-improved cover art when the band was signed by Heavy Artillery. It features enthusiastic thrashing with some infectious riffs but, in truth, it is heavily front-loaded with the first three songs sounding much better than the rest of the album. By track four, Burn in Hell, the cracks start to show and, for me, this is the worst song on the album. The remaining tracks are kind of OK, but being brutally honest, they sound shoddy. The riffs get laboured, the solos are weak and Andy Torres' vocals become even more ragged - and they weren't great to begin with. The band just sound so enthusiastic that I feel bad knocking them, but ultimately they come across as just another Exodus, Exumer wannabe without the chops. the brilliant Ed Repka cover doesn't help either as it raises expectations for the music which it fails to fulfil.
I am far from any great authority on death metal, there are huge swathes of releases I am not that keen on, it's obsession with brutality, coupled with some of the more distasteful imagery and at the other end of the spectrum, the constipation of technically obsessed DM leaves me mostly unimpressed. I do love a good old-school release however, in the vein of Autopsy, Morbid Angel and the like. I've paid scant attention to Incantation previously, only having heard their debut and their latest albums before (both of which I did enjoy). So I went into this expecting something pretty decent, but man, this is earth-shatteringly brilliant death metal of a kind I hear too infrequently. It takes the OSDM sound and couples it with more ambitious songwriting that involves multiple changes in tempo during each track from battering brutality, through medium-paced riff-fests to death doom crawls. The vocals are archetypal abyssal growls that have, presumably, helped to define what a death metal singer should sound like, the guitars have a perfect filthy solidity to their tone that buzz and batter like a chainsaw crossed with a sledgehammer. The one thing that really stood out for me though, was the supergnarly bass sound. That growling bass guitar during Ethereal Misery is absolutely insane and has got to be one of my favourite pieces of basswork ever. All this is before we even get to the sixteen minute closing epic, Unto Infinite Twilight / Majesty of Infernal Damnation, a proggy (in a good way), sixteen minute death metal saga that doesn't try to impress with technical flashiness, but rather the quality of the songwriting and the searing intensity of the bands performance. I'm also guessing here that this track was a big influence on Blood Incantation and their similar epic on their Hidden History of the Human Race album (another DM fave of mine coincidentally).
I love it when an album comes out of nowhere and grabs me by the throat like Diabolical Conquest has done. I'm gonna go out on a limb here and, even after only a couple of listens, I reckon this is a five star classic and one of my all-time favourite death metal albums.
Green Druid play a brand of doom metal that concentrates more on building atmosphere than hammering out full-on riff-fests. Borrowing heavily from the stoner doom of early Electric Wizard, adding in psychedelic elements, especially the extended lead jams (at times even edging close to heavy space rock, particularly on Rebirth), with varied vocals that add to, rather than detract from, the overall atmospheric nature of the sound. Green Druid are obviously a band that like to let the atmosphere build slowly, consequently Ashen Blood's seven tracks clock in at just under an hour and a quarter, so is probably not for the uncommited doomster. But if you have the patience, you will be rewarded.
I passed up on this for quite some time, finding myself put off by the marathon two hour run time. What an idiot! I have deprived myself for several months of one of the best black metal albums ever committed to plastic. I thought Paysage's self-titled was a great album, but with this double CD monster he has unleashed his masterpiece. Nobody, but nobody, is better at conveying the sense of being lost in a blizzard, miles from home or safety, than Wintherr. My first job after leaving school was in a frozen food factory and one of the duties was to clear conveyor belt blockages in blast freezers, the temperature of which was set at -40°C. It has taken forty years, but finally an album has reproduced the feeling of such bone-numbing coldness in musical form. Of course, what was missing then that is indeed present here is the abject feeling of isolation and despair of ever seeing journey's end. Fortunately I have never been hopelessly lost without shelter and fearing for my very survival, but now at least I know how it feels.
Heavily-influenced by early, black metal-era Burzum, Wintherr has brought the icy forest theme that runs through much of atmospheric black metal and, indeed, the overarching storyline of his own career, to it's apotheosis. Some albums seem more than just another release, feeling as if the artist has poured their entire being into the endeavour and I'm Wald, I would suggest, is one such album. As a huge fan of atmo-black, I would absolutely put this up on equal footing with any of the classics of the genre.
Onirik hails from Portugal, hardly known as a hotbed for black metal and is the solo project of one Gonius Rex who has released several reasonably-received albums since 2004 under the moniker. For me, this is my first exposure to the project so I went in having no particular expectations for this latest album. It features seven songs with a total running time of forty-five minutes, the longest, Assigned to the Inexorable Flames, weighing in at nine minutes. Vocally, Gonius Rex goes more for the croaking style of Abbath rather than soul-shredding shrieking and actually sounds impressively evil. Lyrically the themes explored involve the usual dark, occult-based search for forbidden knowledge and experience so intrinsically linked to black metal's core aesthetic - so far, so expected. Musically, it is a bit more ambitious than that however, with a discordant, busy guitar sound that gives it some avant-garde credentials and replaces traditional black metal riffs with a still direct, but more chaotic style that is heavily influenced by Deathspell Omega I would suggest. The overall effect is a lightning-in-a-jar exercise in controlled chaos and may either set your head a-spinning or fire up your blood, depending on your state of mind at the time of listening. That said, there is an absolute killer of a riff during penultimate (and my personal favourite) track Murmurs of the Aging Vessel that any real fan of black metal should lap up and closer Apathy of Might is in a more conventional black metal vein than the preceeding forty minutes. Initially I was under the impression that this was entirely a solo project, so was extremely impressed by Gonius Rex's drum skills, but this isn't the case, rather he hired ex-Enslaved and Gehenna skinsman Dirge Rep to handle the drumming. I think this was a very sound decision as an electronic kit or a less adept practitioner could have had a severe detrimental effect on the album's execution, but Rep's skills are such that the material is significantly enhanced by his presence. The songwriting and instrumental skills exhibited by Gonius Rex mark him as an exceedingly talented individual with black metal circles and this talent probably deserves more attention than Onirik currently enjoy.
Overall, this isn't actually the style of black metal I prefer, I am much more of a traditionalist, yet there is something about this album that appeals and I can't help but keep coming back to it and I guess that is the mark of a great album, so I consider this one a winner.
This second part of Árstíðir Lifsins' Saga á tveim tungum could be accused by some (although not me) of failing to grab the listener's attention out of the gate. It starts off at a gentle pace with the first two tracks, opener Ek býð þik velkominn being a folky acoustic song and second track, Bróðir, var þat þín hǫnd, being an even more ephemeral ambient number, both songs utilising whispery spoken vocals. So by the time Sem járnklær nætr dragask nærri kicks in we are ten minutes into the album and if it's an all-out pummelling black metal assault you've been waiting for, then I gotta say, your patience will have been well rewarded at this point. After the initial, possibly overplayed, slow build the album is actually paced very nicely with a balance between the folk-tinged parts, the frenzied blasting and some great medium-paced, epic-sounding viking metal, all of which makes the album as a whole really sound like a mighty saga told by tribal skalds around a roaring fire under the Northern Lights.
If you thought the album got off to a slow start, the finale is spectacular as the tribal ambience of penultimate track, Um nóttu, mér dreymir þursa þjóðar sjǫt brennandi, gives way to the epic seventeen minutes of the simply stunning closer, Ek sá halr at Hóars veðri hǫsvan serk Hrísgrísnis bar, a song to stir the blood and speak to some deep-rooted ancestral part of the human psyche that is drawn to those ancient tales of blood and fire, stories of legendary deeds and mighty heroes and the crashing of waves against a longship hull.
My only regret is that I am unable to understand the words, so the actual content of the album's saga is sadly lost on me, although the intention is more than clear and I can fill in the gaps with imagination.
Rosy Finch have undergone a major lineup change since the release of their debut in 2015. Vocalist Mireia Porto (former vocalist and guitarist of stoner doom band Hela) is now the trio's only remaining original member, being joined by Oscar Soler and Juanjo Ufarte on bass and drums respectively.
Their second album, Scarlet, was mastered by Billy Anderson and is a lot heavier than the debut, adding more of a metallic edge to their stoner grunge sound than previously. The albums ten tracks all have titles related to the colour red and are themed around love, lust, sin, violence and guilt. It is energetic and ascerbic as good rock music should be, with a great guitar tone and a decent rhythm section laying the base for Mireia Porto's acidic vocal attack.
Scarlet's roots are in 90's grunge and noise rock, but with an added modern metal feel this is no nostalgic throwback and it should have a wide appeal to a modern audience.
War Dogs are a five-piece band from Alicante in Spain who play heavy metal with a taste for the epic and swords 'n' sandals imagery with song titles like Castle of Pain, Gorgon Eyes and Wrath of Theseus. the band's sound also incorporates elements of speed metal and, to a lesser degree, european power metal. It's not exactly the type of metal I favour, but I've sure heard a lot worse and it gallops along at a fair clip with a few hot solos, although the songs are all very similar and nothing really stands out. Won't change the world, but for those who like bands like Manowar and Cirith Ungol, there may be more than a passing interest here.
I really loved Hexer's debut, 2017's Cosmic Doom Ritual, it's ominous, sludge-heavy doom was right up my street. Three years on and in a world that is seemingly turning to shit, Hexer's portentious doom seems even more relevant to the world as we are coming to know it and may well be the perfect soundtrack to the impending apocalypse. This time around the tracks are a little shorter, with five of the six in the 6-8 minute range, rather than the 10-12 minutes of the debut. This shortening of the tracks means they build a little less and don't have quite the same disturbing, extended, hypnotic vibe, but it does make them feel a little more vital and desperate as if blurting out their message of inescapable doom to the unsuspecting listener. The band still retains that irresistible, sludgy sound that sucks at your ears like plodding through thick, sucking mud although it also has an echoing quality that sounds at times as if heard along the length of a particularly damp and unpleasant abandoned railway tunnel. It is kind of like Autopsy-style death doom with a "twang" that feels like it was appropriated from bands like The Cramps or The Misfits. The atmosphere is increased by the addition of Lucas Schmücker's subtlely-layered synths and vocalist/guitarist Marvin Giehr's harsh roar provides the album's lyrical expression.
I don't want to give the impression that this is a homogenously slow album because a lot of it isn't and sometimes the band really let rip, such as during closer Typhon, then drummer Melvin Cieslar batters the living shit out of his kit and they hurtle headlong in a dynamic, downtuned mad dash as Giehr roars his defiance into this irresistible gale.
Hexer seem a criminally overlooked outfit to my mind and this, along with the debut, are a couple of the more interesting albums in the doom world from a band that, rather than trying to be cynical clones of earlier successful acts, are instead more interested in releasing personal and heartfelt expressions of a doom-centric view of the world and I say good luck to 'em!
Slovenians Dekadent's fifth album has been four years in the making and it shows in the maturation of the songs and their performance. Their frontman, Artur Felicijan, claims that they "really wanted to go the extra mile with The Nemean Ordeal, to showcase what we’re capable of.” I am happy to report that this is no idle boast and that the band truly are stretching out and adding a real progressiveness to their melodic black metal sound, the result of which is an intelligent and complex album that is at once both visceral and uplifting, the darkness woven through with soaring melodies as exemplified on the final track, the masterful The Nemean Ordeal (Death of a Lion). Highly recommended for anyone with a love of progressive black metal.
Horned Almighty are a Danish black/thrash metal four-piece formed in 2002 from the remains of black metal outfit Mareridt. I have been woefully ignorant of the band until this release (excuse: there's just so much black metal out there!) To Fathom the Master's Grand Design, their sixth album and first for six years, is blistering black metal with searing guitar riffs and throat-tearing, roaring vocals that is as enervating as it is exhilharating in it's nihilistic savagery. Some of the tracks, such as Devouring Armageddon and Swallowed by the Earth, feature slower-paced sections that occasionally hint at doom metal. This easing of the tempo however, only serves to intensify the feeling of impending annihilation that the band seems hell-bent on racing towards and is entirely in keeping with their lyrical theme of armageddon and destruction. At this point, a word must go to bassist Haxen and drummer Harm for their solid and vigorous rhythm section that helps propel the tracks along like NASA rocket fuel, despite the main event being Hellpig's incendiary riffing.
I know it's heresy to say so, but I sometimes struggle to appreciate some of the more technical, avant-garde examples of modern metal, but this kind of vicious, rough-sounding black metal with it's neck-breaking, blood-pumping rhythms and it's calling to the more primal parts of our psyche is right up my proverbial street.
I must confess to having been a bit disappointed by Enslaved's last album E and awaited their new opus with no small amount of trepidation. Luckily my fears have been laid to rest by Utgard. This is more in the vein of my favourite of their proggier (is that even a word?) albums, 2012's RIITIIR. Despite the progressive slant to their music these days, the tracks are actually quite punchy and are shorter than a lot of their black / viking metal classics - only two clocking in at over six minutes. This means there's no excessive prog wankery involved in the tracks, just concise, tightly written and musically varied prog metal.
Whilst Enslaved seem to be on a similar trajectory to that taken by Opeth a few years back and moving further away from their black metal roots, they still maintain enough of a metal edge to their sound to satisfy a large percentage of their original fans. That said, songs like Sequence with it's gently laid-back middle section and the kinetic, Krautrock-influenced Urjotun certainly make for an interesting contrast to the more (black) metal sections and evidence the band branching out ever further. Cato Bekkevold has been replaced by Iver Sandøy behind the drumkit who turns in a solid performance as such (particularly on opener Fires in the Dark) but he crucially adds another dimension to the dynamic of the band with his clean vocals. As always, Enslaved turn in a trademark technically superb performance and must be one of the tightest set of extreme metal performers this side of the aforementioned Opeth.
I guess if you wish to be negative, you could say that if you listened to this expecting to hear Vikingligr veldi or Frost II then you would be sorely disappointed, but those albums were over 25 years ago and the band have matured and branched out but, crucially, not sold out. I am not a massive follower of prog metal I must admit, bands like Dream Theater throwing out album after album of technical circle jerking just seems pointless to me, but when a band like Enslaved move into the area from a more focussed tradition, then I am on board because the songs seem so much more than just technical exercises (excesses?). In fact some of this is actually quite catchy even (Homebound, Distant Seasons) and Ivar Bjørnson can still write some thunderous riffs when he feels the need (Jettegryta, Storms of Utgard). So, despite lasting only 44 minutes, the variety in the tracks and their ability to grab the attention make for a seemingly much more substantial-feeling album that certainly had me reaching for the replay button.
Empire of the Moon formed in 1996 as a duo comprising guitarist/bassist/vocalist Ravenlord Wampyri Draconium and vocalist Ouroboros, releasing a two-track, dungeon synth / dark folk demo in 1997. With the addition of keyboard player S.V. Mantus in 1998 they expanded to a three-piece, then promptly disappeared from the world of recorded music until the release of their debut album in 2014. Fast forward another six years and we are presented with the band's follow-up full-length, Εκλειψις (Eclipse).
The album is a typical example of hellenic black metal with it's generally mid-paced tempo, memorable and melodic guitar riffs and epic and atmospheric style, provided in the main by Mantus' sterling keyboard work. The vocals are savage and ragged-sounding, but still work exceedingly well in concert with the old-school riffing. The bulk of the album's seven tracks form a four-part concept piece, Per aspera ad lunae, which tells the story of the narrator's seeking of and encounter with a couple of dreadful, dark goddesses and is where the album's mystical and occult narrative heart lies.
Εκλειψις doesn't break any new ground it's true and it certainly isn't a difficult album to "get into", but it is a terrific example of greek black metal that stands up well against any in the genre and when a black metal album sounds this damn good then it is definitely worthy of your time.
Whilst there are undoubtedly some great one-man atmospheric black metal outfits (early Burzum, Saor, Panopticon etc) it's great to hear a genuine full band playing the music and the dynamic that creates that sometimes feels a little stilted with solo projects. Ukrainians Drudkh have had a stable four-piece lineup since 2006 and Estrangement was their first metal full-length since that lineup's establishment, following on from the acoustic folk music of 2006's Songs of Grief and Solitude and the somewhat divisive reaction it received.
The album takes the format of three 10 minute tracks and a short final instrumental outro and represents a fine return to form if you believe that Songs of Grief and Solitude was a misstep. Though not quite as brilliant as the band's previous metal album, the classic Blood in Our Wells, this doesn't fall that far short. The longer tracks are sweeping and majestic as you would expect and all four tracks feature terrific guitar solos from Roman Saenko along with some really nice melodies contained in amongst the riffs and blastbeats. Sure the repetitive nature of atmospheric black metal, particularly on longer tracks, isn't everyone's cup of tea and if that is the case for you then Estrangement won't change your mind, but for afficianados the repetition of Drudkh's music doesn't equate to boring, it is the building of layers of sound that contribute to the epic and sweeping nature of the music so effectively that is their real strength. Conceptually the lyrics are based around the words of poet Oleh Olzhych who's poetry was centred on the struggle for Ukrainian independence and who was arrested by the Gestapo for his activities and died in Sachsenhausen concentration camp in June of 1944. Of course this association with Ukrainian nationalism has led the band to being accused of extreme right-wing sympathies, a charge the band have always denied.
That aside, from a purely music-centric point of view, then this album is a really fine example of classic atmospheric black metal and Drudkh are rightfully accepted as one of the prime movers in the genre. I would hold this up with any of the best that atmo-black has to offer and despite three of the four tracks hitting the ten minute mark, at only 35 minutes the album as a whole leaves you wanting more and so heading for the replay button.
Anyone having even a passing familiarity with Darkthrone's output for the past twenty years will immediately recognize where these Canadians got their crusty black metal influence. The great thing about black metal is that it is home to bands that like to push the boundaries and create complex, dense or dissonant albums that challenge the listener, but also bands that just prefer to crank out some good old-fashioned metal tunes. Nocturnal Departure most definitely fall into the latter category and more power to them because some times you just need to let rip with some cathartic and blasphemous black rituals!
I think Drudkh are a fantastic atmospheric black metal band, one of the best the genre has to offer. I'm also quite partial to a bit of folk music, so I thought that this would be right up my street and some of it is very nice indeed. At it's best it is earthy yet fragile-sounding at the same time, but in all honesty a number of the tracks are a bit repetitive and while this is fine in the context of atmospheric black metal when laid bare, as here, it becomes just a little tedious. Still, kudos to the band for trying a different approach and not at all surprising from them really as they are obviously steeped in Ukrainian folklore and proud of their folk roots.
LA's The Crooked Whispers have delivered a debut album of occult-laced doom metal with a vocalist who will undoubtedly divide opinion. The music is Electric Wizard-influenced devil-worshipping doom metal with fat, heavy riffs that is a staple of the doom metal scene. Vocalist Anthony Gaglia (of Portland's LáGoon) however is a different proposition. His singing style is more that of a black metal singer and when his voice kicks in after nearly two minutes of second track Sacrifice's plodding main riff it comes as a bit of an initial surprise. I must say though, by the end of Sacrifice I had become used to it and found it quite an interesting variation to the occult doom template. The lyrics are all hokey, seventies horror movie influenced nonsense as is par for the course, but good fun all the same. All in all a damn solid slab of doom metal with a bit of a twist and at only thirty minutes for it's six tracks (well, four with an intro and outro) it doesn't outstay it's welcome.
Black Lodge was a short-lived Norwegian doom outfit formed in 1993 who split shortly after releasing this, their one and only full-length album. Although this is chiefly a death doom album, it is so much more and is one of the great under-appreciated doom metal releases. Featuring clean female and growled male vocals, you would be forgiven for assuming this leans toward gothic death doom, but it certainly doesn't - Vegar Hoel's male vocals remind me a little of Max Cavalera and as a consequence the album sounds more aggressive than any gothic elements would allow. The tempo slows occasionally to such an extent that it tips over into funeral doom territory such as on Tower Inertial, but the atmosphere is more desperate and angst-ridden than merely despondent and melancholy. I get the sense of a certain defiance from the music and whereas a lot of extreme doom has a feeling of acceptance, this seems to rail against whatever misfortune has bought them to this place. A genuinely cult doom metal album that any fan of the genre should ensure they hear.
Not really a huge, crushing behemoth of tectonic riffs this one as you would probably expect from a Finnish funeral doom band. It has a kind of lo-fi asthetic that removes a fair amount of the heft from the riffs. What it does have though are some great softer parts that have a real contemplative feel to them and make the album as a whole feel a more inward-looking, reflective piece. When viewed in this light, the lighter aspect of the slow riffing then makes a lot more sense. As the product of just a couple of guys (and a third, the lyricist) this is very impressive. The track compositions are ambitious and I found the atmosphere quite affecting as an inner monologue on melancholy and futility. One of those albums you wish more people would give a chance to (but know they probably won't).
I have been inexcusably ignorant of Ultha until this release, but this is seriously epic, with two lengthy tracks of intense and atmospheric black metal that speak to something deep and darkly mysterious in us all. Seemingly without even trying, they have tapped into the spine-tingling, menacing atmosphere of the Cthulhu Mythos far more successfully than any number of bands that have intentionally tried to have managed.
After the opening blister of Ritual Impurity (Seven of the Sky Is One), although I cannot deny that it gets the blood pumping, I feared this would be one of those breakneck death metal albums where the emphasis on battering everything into submission renders it all a blur of indistinguishable, fever-fuelled noise. Luckily after that initial onslaught, the band slow the tempo a bit and the tracks come more into focus and is a far more enjoyable prospect as a result. Second track Propitiation has an extended build-up that reminds me a bit of the intro to Seasons in the Abyss, before exploding into a cracking, throbbing chunk of malevolent death doom. The album then continues with a trade-off between those manic, pummelling, fast-tempo bursts of energy and the hulking menace of the slower-paced doomy sections. John McEntee's vocals are undimmed by time and he still produces an archetypal death growl, despite his fifty years, that many try and fail to replicate.
So, in closing I've got to say that this is a pretty impressive album for a death metal band edging thirty years in the game, showing no dimming of the fire in their belly and a damn sight better than most of their peers have managed for many a long year!
I haven't really listened to Finntroll for about ten years, apart from the occasional blast of the Trollhammaren EP, after being very disappointed by their Nifelvind album, so appproached this album with no great enthusiasm. The fanfare overture opening track didn't reassure me much and my heart started to sink, but more fool me because it's actually a pretty damn good album after that, I would go as far as to say their best since Nattfödd. Finntroll's humppaa-influenced folk metal has a real fun quality to it, one of the few black metal albums you can actually imagine people jigging along to. It's easy to picture the band in a nighttime forest clearing, pissed as farts, dancing around a bonfire to this album. There a symphonic element to it provided by the keyboards and the odd blast or two, but mainly this is just good-time, fun, folk-heavy, black metal and as such is a return to what originally stoked my fondness for the band.
I must preface this review by admitting that I am no huge fan of Overkill, their longevity withstanding, I have always been underwhelmed by their recorded output. Having never seen them live, I am surmising that their live shows are the real source of their popularity. Anyway, the New Jersey thrasher's 1985 debut is a disappointing record in so many ways. The production isn't great and there's a muddiness to the sound that doesn't lend anything to thrash metal in general and this in particular. Secondly and more importantly, the band don't sound committed to the thrash ethos, large portions of the album sounding like Iron Maiden or Mercyful Fate demos. Now there's nothing wrong in sounding like either of those metal titans, but Overkill were always pushed as a THRASH band. When they do cut loose such as with Hammerhead, then they are pretty effective, despite the poor production. Thirdly, why end with a piss-poor cover of Dead Boys' Sonic Reducer, a classic US punk track? Sure they have stuck around for a long time, but weren't helped by this lacklustre debut, which is why they were never held in as high regard as some of their peers, being released as it was around the same time or after albums like Ride the Lighting, Spreading the Disease, Hell Awaits, Bonded by Blood, To Mega Therion and Seven Churches, against any of which it is a poor substitute.
Originally intended as a split album where each band covered the others tracks, Stygian Bough has become a much different (and undoubtedly more interesting) proposal. As everyone is aware I'm sure, Erik Moggridge, aka Aerial Ruin, provided some of the vocals for Bell Witch's Mirror Reaper. On this collaboration he has become an even more integral part of the set up and if ever a collaboration was meant to be then this is it. The two outfit's styles, though seemingly very different, actually combine perfectly to produce a truly unique atmosphere of wistful melancholy. The fact that Bell Witch generate their atmosphere without guitars, relying instead on Dylan Desmond's bass and haunting organ and piano from Jesse Shreibman, gives a different dynamic to their sound than some of the glacial, ultra-heavy riffs employed by other leaders in the funeral doom field. Their's is less a soul-crushing, hopeless despondency than a reflective, soul-searching acknowledgement of an inner melancholy and a cathartic coming-to-terms with it. Combining this with Erik Moggridge's gentle acoustic strumming and ethereally serene vocal style gives their music an even more beautifully heart-rending and emotional centre.
The album is basically three sections, spread over five tracks and little in excess of an hour of runtime, with the opening epic, The Bastard Wind, forming the first movement, the two-part Heaven Torn Low forming the second and the short Prelude and concluding track The Unbodied Air forming the third and final movement. The concept of the album is apparently expanded from the song Rows (Of Endless Waves) from Bell Witch's 2012 album Longing and deals with the tale of the ghost of a long-dead king, trapped in the ocean's endless waves, who longs to reach the land where he believes he will be reborn to rule again.
The Bastard Wind opens it's almost twenty minutes with an introspective first four minutes featuring Moggeridge's gentle acoustic guitar and sorrowful vocals before Dylan and Jesse dive in with their heaving waves of bass and drum crashing over the listener and leaving them lying submerged as if suspended in some giant sensory deprivation tank with only their own inner emotions for company. Part one of Heaven Torn Low, subtitled The Passage, is a lengthier example of Aerial Ruins particular style of melancholy neofolk featured in The Bastard Wind's opening that really is as gorgeous as it is haunting, it's thirteen minutes being one of the most exceptional examples of this style of folk I have encountered to date. Part two, subtitled The Toll, is the Yang to part one's Yin as the Bell Witch boys heave in once more, the pace slows, the atmosphere thickens and Erik's ephemeral vocals soar over the boiling morass they create. After the short instrumental Prelude, the album's closer The Unbodied Air begins it's epic twenty minutes and features the album's heaviest moments before calming towards the track's midpoint, then once more soaring to the album's final moments.
In many ways Bell Witch, particularly with this collaboration, have taken their cue from the likes of Patrick Walker's Warning and delivered a more vulnerable and consequently more affecting and personal take on extreme doom and for that I salute them and congratulate them on some of the most gorgeous extreme metal music to date.
Terrific nature-themed atmospheric black metal that celebrates the interconnection between the Sahara desert and the Amazon rainforest in an environmental cycle that acts as the lungs of the planet. Successfully creates a vision of the immensity of the forces involved with vast, sweeping soundscapes to rival the genre's best. The vocals are submerged in the mix as if heard from a great distance or from within the deafening whisper of the planet's natural forces.
A mention must also go to Brandon Zackey who guests on drums and turns in a fine nuanced performance, yet can still pummel the shit out of his kit when the need arises. On the evidence of this, West Maddox, the man behind Ovnev, appears to have the talent to stand alongside the likes of Andy Marshall and Austin Lunn as a champion of naturalistic black metal.
A two-track EP clocking in at a mere seven minutes, released after a three year wait following Ieschure's debut album The Shadow, is a brief affair, but is quality nonetheless. Opening track Cold Stars of Eternity is very much a black metal funeral dirge, with it's slow, ominous pacing, especially when Lilita shrieks (more than a little disturbingly) "Human bones and human flesh... Human heart was alive, Now is dead."
The EP's second track, In the Waves of Darkness, is even more unsettling with it's droning, noise-drenched background and double-tracked vocals that shriek desperately whilst simultaneously intoning the lyrics in an emotionless monotone. Feels like the kind of track that some noise / drone protagonists would drag out to twenty minutes or more, but is a very effective three minutes.
Purification released their debut, Destruction of the Wicked, in June of 2019. That album had a lo-fi aesthetic and a real stripped-back, no frills approach to doom metal. Fourteen months later and with an improved recording technique, the band have added a more psychedelic, early seventies, occult mask onto their doom-riden visage. This makes for a decent slab of metal and it certainly has some good moments, but I must confess that there was something about their previous doom metal fundamentalism that I just found more appealing.
Still, this is not an album to be sniffed at and may well appeal to a wider audience than their previous output due to the better sound and more popular occult metal atmosphere of the record.
Jupiterian is a four-piece behemoth that hails from São Paulo, it members going by the initials R, A, V and P. Protosapien is their third album, following three years after the fairly well received Terraforming. This album feels like such an advance from that still decent record that I can't help feeling that the band members must have encountered a black monolith somewhere down there in Brazil during the last three years!
Protosapien begins with a short intro, Homecoming, a dirge-like fanfare that sounds like it is announcing the arrival of a long-sought but dreaded god-king, which in a way it kind of is. The god-king in question takes the form of a sonic alliance between cavernous death doom and oozing, soul-crushing sludge metal that brooks no opposition to it's unholy assault on the ears, forcing all who hear it to bow down in supplication. Despite being a fairly short album of just over 35 minutes, this feels immense. The music doesn't compromise on it's heaviness yet is surprisingly atmospheric in a way that allows the mind's eye to conjure images of shattered landscapes, smoking ruins and immense, dreadful apparitions. The tectonic riffs will literally shake your walls and Thiago Oliveira's guttural vocals will bring them crashing down as they undermine their very foundations. Despite this intrinsic heaviness and the sludge-drenched slow tempo, there is still a memorable and even kind of melodic quality to the tracks - this is no monotonous trudge through to album's end, in fact Voidborne even contains some blasting that wouldn't be out of place on a black metal album.
2020 has been a damn good year for fans of ominous-sounding doom metal with great albums from the likes of Hell's MSW, Temple of Void and Convocation. Protosapien can rightly take it's place alongside those as one of the best doom-related releases of the year.
As with many visionary metal bands, Venom were derided mercilessly in their early days. I remember the UK music press (including Kerrang!) lambasting them at every turn as a band that couldn't even play their instruments properly. Of course, those same people have no recollection of ever having done so and claim to have been supporters of the band from the outset - hypocrites. Of course Welcome to Hell sounds sloppy, but that only adds to it's charm. The album took the speed metal of Motörhead, added some cartoonish satanic imagery (that later bands took FAR too seriously) and then went at it with a youthful enthusiasm born of the UK DIY punk scene. In fact, with his north-eastern accent Cronos often sounds like the legendary Mensi of The Angelic Upstarts.
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, in common with most of England's northern cities, was a grim place to grow up in the seventies and early eighties, but where the punks took out their frustration with songs about how shit everything was, Venom sought catharsis and escape through songs based on Dennis Wheatley books and Hammer Horror movies. Bold, brash and full of balls, this was an album that was made by a band who clearly did not give a damn what anybody thought about them. Often lumped in with the NWOBHM, I would argue this has far more in common with Discharge, GBH and The Exploited than Iron Maiden or Saxon, but they were too punk for the metal crowd and too metal for the punks, so for a long time had to plough their own furrow with only their diehard fans for company. The band's outsider cred is what probably endeared them to the even younger up and coming bands they influenced including Metallica, Bathory, Mayhem and the band probably closest to them in term of attitude, Darkthrone. I would argue that without Motörhead there woud never have been a Venom, but certainly without Venom there would not have been a black metal scene as we recognise it.
Of course the album shouldn't only be judged on it's historical importance. Any fan of high-energy, down and dirty speed metal, particularly in the vein of Lemmy and his crew should love tracks like the title track, Witching Hour, In League With Satan and my personal favourite, Live Like an Angel (Die Like a Devil). All hail Venom, the outsiders of the outsiders and the patient zero of extreme metal.
The Boats of the Glen Carrig is a survival horror novel written in 1907 by William Hope Hodgson, set in the early 18th century. In the novel the author purports to be one of several survivors of the sinking of the ship The Glen Carrig, who were cast adrift onto the open sea in two lifeboats and were confronted by monstrous creatures as they fought for survival. Ahab's fourth album is a concept album based upon the novel and continues the band's obsession with all things nautical.
They have developed their sound from the days of the phenomenal debut, The Call of the Wretched Sea and now feature more of a contrast between dark and light passages than the debut's unrelentingly bleak funeral doom. Boats.. owes as much to death doom as funeral doom and is consequently more uptempo in pacing than TCotWS at times. It also features several clean passages, both vocally and musically, that derive from post-metal outfits like Isis, that serve as contrast to the heavier, darker sections, throwing them into sharp relief and act as the narrator's conduit to the listener. TBotGC is a step up from it's predecessor, The Giant, which I felt had moved too far away from the crushing heaviness of the first two albums to inhabit a more accessible, post-metal landscape. Boats, however is a satisfying meeting of that clean, lighter sound, the debilitating, deep-sea pressure of the band's take on funeral doom and pacier, yet still supremely heavy, death doom.
The Isle sets the scene with a gentle, clean intro as the narrator, a passenger named Winterstraw, begins telling how the survivors have been adrift for five days after the sinking of the Glen Carrig, before erupting into an ominously foreboding passage of malignant death doom as land, in the form of the ill-starred isle, is approached by the unfortunate seamen, strange weeping cries emanating from it. The Thing That Made Search follows a similar structure, with a vocally and musically clean beginning as the narrator now tells of the sailors' rising fear, before Daniel Droste's voice changes to that of a growling demon and the monster riff kicks in as the lifeboats and their trembling human cargo are sought out and examined by some many-tentacled Lovecraftian horror. The track slows to a crawl in it's dying moments as the creature withdraws and sinks back into the depths.
Like Red Foam (The Great Storm) builds on the thundering riffs that went before and ups the pacing as a mighty, supernatural storm batters the ill-fated sailors. Red Foam is a song that could easily have come from a classic-era Opeth album, exhibiting the same songwriting skill and musical chops that Mikael Akerfeldt employed to devastating effect aroung the turn of the Millenium. Ahab return to their roots for the beginning of The Weedmen as the slowest section of the album oozes through the listener's inner ear with a slab of glacially-paced funeral doom, the sailors are washed up on the unnamed island and realise it is the home of the hideous Weedmen, the music invoking the mounting, unbearable fear and dread they feel as they come under attack.
To Mourn Job then returns to the structure of the first two tracks with alternating gently sorrowful clean sections and thunderous death doom passages as the narrator describes the aftermath and the sailors perform funeral rites and mourn the loss of one of their number, a young lad named Job, during the attack of the monstrous creatures.
Most versions, except the original jewel case CD, have a sixth track, The Light in the Weed (Mary Madison), which serves as a kind of epilogue, telling of the fate of the titular Mary Madison, wife of the captain of the doomed Glen Carrig. Now, seven years later and unable to deal with what she saw and felt she has become hopelessly lost, drink her only solace in a world that can hold such horrors, the track filled with melancholy and sadness for those affected, yet with also with a hopeful message that if one holds steadfast then you can deal with any "seas so grave".
I still hold The Call of the Wretched Sea in the highest regard as Ahab's best, but this is not so far behind, a beautifully crafted musical rendition of a classic horror tale that is expressive and subtle whilst still retaining the ability to crush with powerful and irresistibly heavy, doom-laden riffs. Ahab are one of the most accomplished of all funeral doom outfits with a songwriting prowess seldom bettered in the genre.
So let's talk about Scott "Wino" Weinrich for a while. Is there really anybody who better exemplifies the ethos of stoner doom metal than Wino? From his lead-heavy, bluesy, stoner riffs and cigarettes 'n' whiskey-soaked vocal delivery to his biker tatts, uncompromising attitude and well-documented crystal meth addiction, there are very few who could stand alongside this guy for sheer metal cred (maybe Lemmy, but that's about it).
Beginning his music career with not one, but two legendary doom bands in The Obsessed and Saint Vitus, after leaving the latter Wino formed Spirit Caravan, a stoner doom three-piece, releasing a couple of well-received albums either side of the Millenium. Spirit Caravan split in 2001 and Wino formed a new trio the following year called The Hidden Hand and that is where this album comes in. Divine Propaganda is the 2003 debut album of the new band, who went on to release two more albums before splitting in 2007.
The album kicks off in strong style, it's first three tracks laying out an impressive calling card. Bellicose Rhetoric and Damyata are trademark fuzzed-up stoner doom with a bit more of a groove going on than Saint Vitus or The Obsessed. Damyata is typical of Wino, a song about environmental disaster, not via a pathetic "why doesn't somebody do something" whine, but in a "we are all fucked" warning - "Oh, I feel the sky is cracking, oh, I feel the ice melting, oh I feel the mountains falling, oh, I feel the world dying". On third track, Screw the Naysayers, Wino even turns on his own fans, hailing his new band and urging everyone to get over the split-up of Spirit Caravan - "Caravan has slipped away, The Hidden Hand is here to stay, screw the naysayers". The track is only 72 seconds long and is basically a fuzz-drenched punk track, a legacy of Wino's time with the Obsessed when they used to open for DC hardcore bands like Bad Brains, Black Flag and Minor Threat.
At this point I should just say, this album isn't only about Wino, Bruce Falkinburg does a fine job on bass and backing Wino up on vocals and a particular shout out should go to Dave Hennessy who's drumming is absolutely first class, battering the shit out of his kit like a young Bill Ward or John Bonham.
The album continues to mix heavy, doom-laden stoner grooves with faster, trad metal and punk influenced tracks, occasionally throwing in the odd psychedelic or blues influence, such as on The Last Tree or Sunblood respectively, so there's enough variety on display to satisfy any fan of fuzzed-up metal and any die-hard fan of Wino and his previous bands shouldn't be disappointed.
Cinerous Rain are German multi-instrumentalist Eugen Kohl and Ecuadorian lyricist and vocalist David Freire who are both veterans of a huge number of metal projects. This is a seriously heavy album of atmospheric blackened death metal. It's buzzing, atmo-black riffing is wrought into a savage beast by alloying it with the undeniable brutality of death metal. The vocals are vicious-sounding muted shrieks, although the lyrics are a mystery, even the tracks names are merely roman numerals, so no clue there. This is a moot point however, the atmosphere is everything here and the atmosphere is incendiary. An impressive debut and I hope to hear a lot more from these guys.
Just for the record, Mesarthim haven't started making albums about social commentary. The Degenerate Era is, in fact, a posited astronomical era when the universe no longer makes new stars and is populated by "degenerate" stars like black holes, neutron stars and brown and white dwarfs.
First track, Laniakea (the name of the galactic supercluster that is home to the Milky Way) is the album's longest track at nearly 15 minutes and is a sweeping track that takes some interesting turns including a section that sounds like an 80's arena-rock riff and some gentle minimalist ambient synth work nestling in amongst the more usual expansive and symphonic atmo-black paeon to the awe-inspiring majesty of the cosmos.
The title track is a far more ominous-sounding affair with the doom metal pacing of the first half generating a portentous atmosphere illustrating the darker, colder condition of the universe during this "Degenerate Era". Mind you, around the five minute mark it lets loose with a real buzzing blast followed by a solo that inexplicably reminds me of Brian May (?!) and ending with a nice trance coda.
Time Domain, despite the urgency of the vocals is a melodic and particularly upbeat track. The nine minutes of Paradox follows a very similar template, yet sounds even more savage whilst still maintaining a pleasing melody. Final track 618 is more of a trance-led track and is a satisfying closer to the album.
Mesarthim proves once more to be a unique voice within the black metal community, his huge sweeping sonic canvases perfectly balance a tension between cold black metal savagery and a warmer melodic side with trance-influenced electronica that just works so well.
Mystras is a solo atmospheric black metal project of Greece's Nihilus Ayloss who is probably better known as Spectral Lore, the cosmic black metal project often found in collaboration with Mare Cognitum. Mystras has been begun as an outlet for a thematically different project, swapping the awe-inspiring majesty of the cosmos for medieval folk and tales of the medieval common man's fight for freedom from serfdom and the corruption of those who would set themselves above them. Mystras itself is the name of a fortified town in Laconia, Greece near the ancient city of Sparta that was the focus of a seemingly unending struggle between the Byzantine Empire and the Franks after the Fourth Crusade.
The albums fifty minutes are spread over five tracks of blistering atmospheric black metal interspersed with short interludes of medieval folk-based instrumental music. Under his Spectral Lore monicker I find that LÜÜP becomes a little bit rambling with some jazzy noodling that I never really enjoy, but here with Mystras he is far more focussed. His atmo-black is reminiscent of Panopticon or Winterfylleth, with sweeping atmospherics crafted to inspire the mind of the listener. The medieval interludes are nice, gentle moments that add a kind of context to the lyrical content of the longer tracks and have been produced with the help of a number of guest musicians. The medieval musical themes are used only sparingly within the main tracks, thus avoiding the kitsch of folk metal accusations - this is most definitely, first and foremost, a black metal album.
My particular favourite (and the album's longest track) is The Murder of Wat Tyler, a devastating indictment, both musically and lyrically, of the deception of the Crown against one of the leaders of England's Peasant's Revolt in late fourteenth century England, a period of history I am particularly interested in and it's nice to hear a metal band relating the tale. Castles Conquered and Reclaimed is indeed one of a rare breed in what is seen as the conservative world of metal that, in a similar way to Panopticon's Kentucky, addresses the struggles of the class of society that most often produces it's adherents.
For me this is Ayloss' best album to date. Although I like Spectral Lore, I prefer the focus and rawer, more aggressive sound he has achieved on this.