I’ve found my next Halloween album. You know, the music you put on your stereo, speakers pointing out an open window and blaring into the street for all the trick-or-treaters and their bemused parents? The past few years I’ve used a playlist of Cradle of Filth‘s overwrought instrumentals – way more elegant than the cheapo sound effects discs you find at the store, but not too scary for the kiddies.

But this year, all those pirates, Iron Men and fairy princesses are getting a faceful of the new Gnaw Your Tongues disc. Sorry kids, no candy here, only sickening, crushing black-doom soundscapes to haunt your dreams and send you straight into your parents’ bedroom at 3am, where you’ll likely vomit up a glurt of Skittle-flecked chocolate from your terror relapse. (I’m going to hell).

An Epiphanic Vomiting of Blood (because really, when is vomiting blood not an epiphany?) packs an abattoir full of opera divas, black metal screamers and a full orchestra in black tie, then suits up and charges in for a dual-fisted machete attack. And it doesn’t stop until the room is awash in knee-deep sludge, which then floods out when the doors are finally opened. All for your listening pleasure. Seven tracks with such colorful titles as “And There Will Be More of Your Children Dead Tomorrow” or “My Body is Not a Temple, Nor a Vessel, It’s a Repulsive Pile of Sickness” drag the listener through what can only be described as some alternate hell-dimension version of shimmering post rock. Except here, it’s undulating with sludgy doom, fuzzed-out blackened screams and punctured by knife-stabs of shrieking violins. There’s even a distinct 70s horror movie feel at times – the soaring madness of The Shining‘s eerie strings, or the electronic warblings of Goblin‘s Italian horror scores.

If this all sounds somewhat familiar – Leviathan has been doing this sort of thing for years – it’s elevated by the massive wall of orchestration that frequently rises out of the murk. The title track sounds like stumbling into a symphony hall during the Zombie Apocalypse ^TM and finding the woodwind section feasting on the brass section while still absently pawing at their instruments. The variety of instrumentation here – not just your usual dronescapes – definitely delivers on the insanity, but also adds an unexpected touch of class.

Although it retains some shared elements with black and doom, An Epiphanic Vomiting of Blood can barely be described as metal. You’re certainly not going to rock out to it. It’s great background music though – but for what, I’m not sure. Maybe for rearranging the severed body parts in your freezer, or for making serious love – to a corpse. Or perhaps just boning up on your skullfucking technique with a baby doll and a jar of salsa. You know, your typical Friday night.

Halloween can’t come soon enough.

[Visit the band's website]

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