If you’re unfamiliar, Sorcerer plays a traditional style of doom. Points of reference for me include Candlemass and Dio-era Black Sabbath. It’s a style that’s easy to get wrong and much more difficult to get right. If you don’t enjoy the sub-genre, who even are you? How did you get into my room? Did Lucius let you in? I swear he’s getting gullible in his twilight years.

Oh, the album? Let’s highlight a few tracks, despite there being zero reason to exclude any. The title track, “Reign of the Reaper” is up first because my borderline OCD ass always goes in order. In Sorcerer’s music, what stands out are the epic riffs of Kristien Niemann and Peter Hallgren, as well as the old-school, doomy, glorious vocals of Anders Engberg. If there’s an heir to the throne of Candlemass’ Johan Lǟngquist, it’s Anders. It doesn’t hurt that all other performances are top-notch, but he is the star.

Slightly further into the album, “Eternal Sleep” is perhaps what one could call a ballad. Its main verses are quiet, but the pre-chorus, as well as the chorus, are rousing. Well, relatively speaking, they certainly do not go full speed. When the track gets doomy and heavy for a moment after the second chorus, it makes way for some solo trade-offs. Excellent, thanks, dudes. Maybe I should quit this whole music thing.

At this point, it must be said that there is a slight drop-off in quality from the first half of the album to the second. It is by no means abrupt and a reflection of the quality of the second-half tunes, it’s just that it’s slightly front-loaded. However, excellent tracks still abound, such as the final one “Break of Dawn.” Sorcerer is at their best when they pummel you with their brand of slower epic doom, mixed with Anders’ excellent vocals. You say; “Well, that’s what they do, right?” Yeah, exactly. They’re always at their best. Any more questions, dipshit? The final track is certainly in that “epic” arena, as the first half is quite heavy, and then there’s a moment of folk, followed by another solo trade-off. It’s a stellar, appropriate way to end.

I must admit this almost slipped by. I received the promo, listened a few times, and enjoyed what I heard, but it was at the risk of getting lost amongst all the other promos on which I was working. I then realized, based on the band’s track record, they deserved more listens. I’m glad I kept going back because Reign of the Reaper rewards patience. While catchy choruses and silky-smooth melodies do stand out on initial listens, it all comes together once the apt amount of time is given. I’m by no means the doom expert on staff, but I am one of the top ten. The fact that I don’t believe we have 10 writers shouldn’t dissuade you from giving these dudes your money.

And here, another contender enters the fray – lumbering in from the dark Finnish canyons of Doom-drenched Heavy Metal, trained for battle in the traditions of Candlemass, Cirith Ungol and Solitude Aeturnus. Stand back and marvel! For the might of this two-man colossus, Desolate Realm, will be felt throughout the lands. This album friggin’ rips.

So like, are Scandinavian Heavy Metal duos a thing? Because last year, Sweden’s Sordid Blade dropped their two-headed Manilla Road-loving banger of a record, Every Battle Has its Glory and it came out of seemingly nowhere to becoming one of my favorite records of the year, unabashedly wearing their influences on their sleeves and giving every ounce of effort they had into their performances for an endlessly endearing listen. While Desolate Realm may cling to slightly different heroes, the end result on Legions is still a completely lovable, “Heavy Metal for Heavy Metal’s sake” offering made to make your heart swell with glory. From first note of titular opener “Legions,” this mighty twosome makes it perfectly clear that this sophomore effort is here to firmly plant the band at the front of the pack, swinging confidently at their opponents with fantastic, muscles-flexed riffing and bravado-filled vocals that could inspire entire armies to ford the coldest rivers and climb the highest mountains just to belt along with singer/guitarist/bassist Matias Natolin (Decaying, Altar of Betelgeuze) on top of the world for all to hear. Genuinely, his mix of burly, gruff baritone and the occasional falsetto scream offer such a commanding presence that one could be forgiven for being coaxed into taking up sword and shield in fanatic defense of their new Finnish overlords, and gods know they’d have one hell of a soundtrack to take to war with them – whether it’s the more aggressive “Forsaken Ground” moving down lesser foes with cunning speed, or more epic, anthemic offerings like “Betrayal” and especially “The Lost One” which hammer enemies down with pummeling, relentless force – Desolate Realm is ready, capable, and willing to hit you from any angle.

But of course, the band is truly at its best when it’s most natural colors are shown, and as robust and stout a force as the band is capable of being, it’s when they embrace their darker, plodding inner beast that they’re at their most visceral. Tracks like the friggin’ STANKY “Through the Depths” reveal the band’s towering, moss-covered golem spirit, lumbering from the dankest of bogs to assert their dreary, doom-drenched will. When the song’s bridge starts  just past the half-way mark, the band really starts to cook, first unleashing an almost Bolt Thrower-like rumble that builds and builds before Natolin returns to a super strong riff introduced earlier in the song, and lunching his most blood-pumping, eagles-screaming falsetto yet. If that track can’t get you swinging a war hammer with reckless fervor and glee, maybe the crushing heft of “Revelation” is enough to stomp your bitter foes like the ants they are. Of all tracks, this certainly showcases Desolate Realm at peak doom – hulking it’s way forward with maximum heft and punishing groove, bordering closer and closer to Crowbar/Eyehategod sludge territory to drag you through the muck and the mud and leave all standing in their way a smear upon the earth. I’d imagine if I were a troll being unleashed on Helm’s Deep, this is the track that’d be playing in my head while swimming in the blood of humans and elves being crushed beneath my boulder-sized fists, if that paints a proper enough picture for you.

These two tracks do an especially nice job of highlighting my favorite part of Legions – and that’s Natolin’s perfectly filthy guitar tone that gives Desolate Realm more grunt than some of their genre counterparts. While certainly not the all-out chainsaw barrage of HM-2 fiends like Entombed or Dismember,  there is juuuuuust enough of a buzzy bite in those guitars that you can really feel their gnarly teeth dig in and take hold. To use yet another Lord of the Rings reference, it’s a tone unbefitting of Elves, Men or even Dwarves – this is the kind of  tone the Black Uruks might deploy; dank, murky, but with enough cutting edge to leave a deep, nasty mark on any target unfortunate enough to be caught within the arc of their blades. If you’re not a dork like me and have no idea what I’m on about, I just mean it’s just the right amount of dirty as to feel evil and foreboding. And then there’s the dude’s voice – a commanding, assertive presence that oozes strength and power, but still with that gruff undertone that makes him more Saruman than Gandalf – righteous and all-powerful, but with an evil edge. It’s a perfect harmony between vocals and guitars that make Desolate Realm all the more compelling.

As Heavy Metal’s theater of battle continues to swell with heroes of all shapes, sizes and manner of intent, I’ll be keeping a close eye on the efforts of this two-man bringer of thunder and doom. Their punch, it seems, hits with much greater force than their diminutive numbers might otherwise suggest. The dark horses have arrived, and they’re not to be taken lightly. Legions is one hell of a hammer blow.

Of course – part of the reason we care, that Candlemass is held in such high regard to begin with, is because they essentially invented the genre of Epic Doom Metal with that seminal record. Never mind that Langquist was never more than a fill-in when called upon by the band over the last three decades, you can’t lend such a massive contribution to the world of metal without creating a certain cult-like following. Still, while that’s all well and good, I don’t think it’s an unfair question to ask – what does a band, even one as influential as Candlemass, still have to offer to the world of metal in 2022? Are they better off living in the past, celebrating the work that made them so revered in the first place? Or is there still room for growth?

Well, when Candlemass officially brought Langquist into the band for 1998’s The Door to Doom, the buzz surrounding the return of the original lineup was somewhat quelled by the fact that the album, while not bad by any stretch, didn’t seem to change the notion that guitarist Lars  Johansson and bassist/chief songwriter Leif Edling had kinda been on autopilot since 2009’s Death Magic Doom. Such is the burden of heavy expectation, right? Also WE GET IT. You guys invented a doom subgenre! Great for you! You don’t see Venom running around forcing “Black Metal” into every other album title. It was a weird sort of posturing that, despite a few decent tracks (I’ll be honest, “Splendor Demon majesty” and “Death’s Wheel” were bangers), felt somewhat like Door to Doom itself – a bit unnecessary.

So here we are again four years later wondering if, maybe, the band has found a little more juice and inspiration so make a bigger impact. To start, I’ll give credit where it’s due – Langquist, as he did on Death Magic Doom, sounds pretty great! Maybe it was more personal reasons that kept the band from making him an official member in the past, who knows, but I’m having a hard time seeing any reason not to have brought him in sooner given his recent performances. Where Messiah gave the band much more of a dramatic flair, Langquist’s vocals lend a much more wildly appealing, straightforward performance that, nonetheless, is as technically impressive as it is impassioned. Think of it as Black Sabbath transitioning from Ronnie James Dio to former Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan – he may not have been quite as captivating as Dio (I mean, who was?) but the difference in vocal delivery did add a sort of refreshing change to the overall sound. Langquist also adds more of a gruff undertone with his vocals, perhaps adding even more to the heft of Lars Johansson and Mappe Bjorkman’s riffs which, as always, are plenty hefty on their own. “Wizard of the Vortex” starts the album with a doozy, a classic doom bruiser dripping with dark, morose intent. It carries some of that grave-like atmosphere that I felt was missing not only on their prior release, but has been missing to some extent from the band’s sound for a while now, setting Sweet Evil Sun off on a really good start.

That genuine feeling of doomy dread doesn’t end there, either. “Black Butterfly” is classic Candlemass through and through, plodding along like a funeral procession, while adding a bit of life with the use of more-than-appropriate organ work to the mix to accentuate the chorus. While the pacing could easily becoming overbearing over the course of the track’s nearly 6 minutes, the band breaks it up really nicely half-way through, first with an excellent change of riff to go along with Johansson’s reliably excellent lead work, and then briefly going double-time to shake off and dust that might have settled to get your blood pumping back at a normal rate. “When Death Sighs” continues the emphasis on that slower, classic doom vibe, bringing in a guest appearance by Avatarium‘s  Jennie-Ann Smith (Avatarium was originally founded by Leif Edling, so I suppose that wasn’t a difficult collaboration to put together), and “Goddess” continues the organ-accented, crypt-loving old school vibes that longtime fans should eat up with glee, with the latter featuring one of the band’s most righteous Heavy Metal riffs and solos they’ve recorded in a while.

And that’s where Sweet Evil Sun really hits its stride – when the band is able to blend the old school doom they helped to create, while embracing the more Heavy Metal leaning riffs they’ve become more known for in recent years. “Angel Battle” may be one of the band’s strongest tracks in some time – a righteous mix of monstrous, lumbering riffs, and pure, epic heavy metal aggression that hits with just about every trick in the band’s bag, including one of Langquist’s best performance since his comeback. “Crucified” pulls off a similar trick, showcasing a band willing to embrace all aspects of the sound they’ve built over nearly 40 years to create a better sense of balance and pacing over the album’s duration. That said, there’s still a couple miscues and nitpicks – “Sweet Evil Sun,” as catchy as it is, seems out of place with the rest of the album, as if the band intentionally wrote the song as a single on its own separate from the rest of the album. It’s not a bad song – like I said, it’s actually pretty dang catchy and will likely worm its way into your head in some capacity – but compared to the rest of the album, it just isn’t quite cutting the mustard. The album’s second single, Scandinavian Gods,” faces a sort of similar issue – not so much in the catchiness department, but moreso in that it also seems to exist sort of on it’s own aside from the rest of the album, incorporating some kinda trippy, strange drum effects to create a sort of synthetic arena rock track. Maybe in that way, the song will work really well in a live setting – but here on recording? It seems self-indulgent and weird.

All that said, I think what Candlemass has created here is a more than worthy addition to their catalog, and certainly an improvement over their previous “original lineup” effort. I wouldn’t necessarily say they’re reinventing themselves or creating something altogether “new,” instead the band seems to simply have found an extra sense of vigor and passion for their art that should make both longtime fans, and whoever’s left yet to discover this legendary act, plenty to latch onto and enjoy. I also appreciate that they didn’t even have a single track on Sweet Evil Sun that included the word “doom” in it, so that’s something!

Well, it’s finally here! A new Solstice album! And it’s utterly worth the wait, even if about half of the material is from the 2016 To Sol a Thane vinyl/digital demo the band released on bandcamp.

Despite the band’s status, their vocalists in the past, Morris Ingram (New Dark Age) or Simon Matravers (Lamentations and Halcyon) have always been the band’s weak link to me (just my opinion mind you). But that has finally been rectified as Paul Kearns (Fifth Dominion, Arcane Sun, Eden Obscured) joined the fold in 2011 and is absolutely stunning on White Horse Hill, elevating the already majestic, doomy, rousing heavy metal to another level. His voice is a perfect match, with a clear, epic, soaring delivery that’s powerful, austere and not too falsetto. I’d kill to hear him on a rerecorded version of “The Sleeping Tyrant”.

Speaking of that legendary track, musically, “The Sleeping Tyrant” also stands as a clear backbone for the new (ish) material. Starting with intro “III” (yeah, the third album), with Kearns teasing the rest of the album before “To Sol A Thane” rumbles into view with one of 2018’s best opening riffs, a aural manifestation of pure, brilliant heavy metal that will give you goosebumps. The title track is more of the same, with a thunderous, fist raising gait and crunch, showing how goddamn good these guys are at riffs and allows Kearns to really show his range. The album’s centerpiece though is new, new 13 minute  track “Under Waves Lie Our Dead”, a more somber, traditionally doomy number that saunters with despondent power and range that’s as much Moody Blues‘ “Knights in White Satin” as it is Candlemass or Iron Maiden. It peaks with glorious soaring, melodies and riffs that will stay with you long after the album is over.

On the very minor down side, as I mentioned earlier, a lot of this material was already released, and there are only 3 full ‘songs’ on the album with four being interludes or purely acoustic/instrumental numbers (“III”, “Beheld, a Man of Straw”, “For All Days, And For None”, “Gallow Fen”) , and while they add to the austere majesty of the album, I want more riffs goddammit! Surely after 20 years, there’s some more waiting to be unleashed? Plus, closer “Gallow Fen” seems to about to deliver one of the album’s best climactic songs, and it suddenly stops. I actually checked to see if my promo download was complete or cut short.

None of that stops White Horse Hill being one of 2018s best albums and well worth the 20 year wait for  follow up to New Dark Age. I’m glad Dark Descent is handling the CD version ( the digital/bandcamp version has been out for a while now), I could not think of a better label to handle this epic /long awaited comeback (including a yet as unnamed bonus track for the CD version). Let’s hope that the next album isn’t a twenty year wait and has a full set of brand new, epic heavy metal.