Seeing this band’s metamorphosis from a death metal band to then infuse elements of progressive death metal, NWOBHM, and hard rock into their sound, well they no longer resemble the band that released that debut over a decade ago.  Their music fascinates me, and is complex, and when it was announced in 2023 they were nixing the hiatus and were back with a new album.

Laurent Teubl Vocals, Guitars (lead), Bass, Keyboards, Cedric Teub/Guitars (rhythm) David Dankert Drums are back, well kind of sort of.  Cedric was the new addition – the brother of Laurent and welp..I think this lineup, which had been crafting this album, were intent on releasing it…and that is precisely what happened.  However, I am unsure what happened after crafting the album since Laurent is the only remaining member.  Whether he gets session musicians, full time members or packs the band in, once and for all, remains to be seen.  So it would seem the fourth Chapel of Disease album – Echoes of Light, is somewhat of a miracle to have even been released.

With the varying changes in their musical direction, which began on their second album the outstanding The Mysterious Ways of Repetitive Art, Echoes of Light brings in those influences again and really is a continuation of the last album from 2018.  All the way down to the album cover with no band logo (I’m not a fan of this trend, over the last several years)  6 songs in 42 minutes this album is all about quality and is there ever on this.  The title track, an 8+ minute number, opens up in musical style as the last album did with the emotive guitar melodies and progressive instrumentation.  The drums build up and the jam moments are prevalent especially with the guitar riffing jamming at the 2 minute moment.  A lot of progressive atmosphere and the vocals from Laurent finally come in at the 3 minute mark with his gruff, not overly brutal, vocals, which are still death metally, his thick German accent cutting through.  The music is a progressive form of metal, which is still kind of hard to describe.  I’ve heard the band has leanings towards Sweden’s Tribulation, who for the most part I am unfamiliar with, but maybe I need to check out.  This song picks up the pace, to a gallop with excellent sounding drums and killer double bass and guitar melodies.  The song gets softer, more atmospheric until the 6.35 faster shredding moments take center stage with the guitar solos piped in much higher in the mix and the song gallops along and truly a mesmerizing opening song.

“A Death Though No Loss”, another 8+ minute number opens with an ungodly catchy guitar riff and the song picks up the pace.  Very similar to quick galloping NWOBHM, to the point of it sounding like power metal.  I am loving this beginning, then the vocals come in and the song settles down a bit, then picks up the pace again.  The guitar work, melodies, and riffing are quite extraordinary, and just like their prior 2 albums, emotive and a lot of feeling are being played with these songs.  Halfway in the song takes a hard rock approach in style, or traditional heavy metal for that matter.  We get solos, guitar slides, and monstrous-sounding drums on this song.  Another excellent song.

“Gold / Dust” starts very mellow then the electric kicks in and with very few lyrics, we get a song drenched in emotiveness and clean vocals to boot.  Which really go well with this more of a jam session song, with just fantastical and whimsical guitar melodies and riffing.  Quite catchy and even tinges toward 70’s heavy metal, with this sucker.  “An Ode to the Conqueror” closes out the album and quite honestly I wonder if the song placement was strategic on the band’s part, in the event they knew this to be their swansong.  This song is progressive and with clean and brooding, sad type of vocals.  The moments of metal do not enter, until the end of the song, which is for a very short time and as this beautifully constructed song slowly fades away, one cannot help but wonder is this the end for Chapel of Disease.

Echoes of Light is killer, from start to finish.  From a production and musical standpoint this truly is incredible.  Is this the end of Chapel of Disease?…only time will tell.  What I can tell you is this is in a four-way tie for AOTY for me with the other 3 bands being Morta Skuld, Drown in Sulphur and Exhorder.

But after a 5-year silence since 2018’s The Scythe of Cosmic Chaos, they are back from the abyss to reclaim their throne as one of death metal’s top acts with a magnificent album that should be lauded as one of years very best releases.

The basic tenets of the band’s style are in place from The Scythe of Cosmic Chaos ; a  dense layered, style of atonal, but eerily and sneakily melodic form death metal that is befitting the Lovecraftian subject matter of undulating, but majestic horror.

And on Seven Crowns and Seven Seals, all of that is magnified and increased. The immense and regal murkiness is further fleshed out for a surprisingly, melodic, but still nauseating sound. The increased use of some clean chanted vocals here and there adds to the ritualistic churn, that’s still massively imposing.

Look no further than the first real track (after intro “Somber Tidings”), “Hammer From the Howling Void”, where the perfect balance of filthy discordance and sneaky, subtle layers of melody are fully on display, and along with those aforementioned chants, you often feel like Nyarlathotep himself is being summoned and is about to rise from the abyss and destroy the world.

And that aura continues for the album’s, massive 46-minute entirety. In particular, the standout title track, where the chorus/chant’s repetitive nature, drones and lulls you into an almost trancelike state. “The Yearning Abyss Devours Us” and “Arcane Cambrian Sorcery” are also ritualistic, twisting menacing numbers that blast, sway, and lumber with foreboding, sickly splendor as does the hauntingly grandiose 9-minute closer “Beyond the Ziggurats”.

But the band can still bring the thunderous ick as heard on the third track “Usurper of the Earth and Sea“, (as well buried in all the aforementioned tracks) with plenty of blasts and atonal leads, that still reek of foreboding, ceremonial filth.

Sulphur Aeon is once again back and atop death metal’s food chain with an immense album that would make Azathoth mosh in world world-ruining pit of galactic destruction.

It all starts with a bang “New World Lethargy” is the blast fest that makes me happy. Endstille has this amazing guitar tone that is unique to them, it’s incredibly raw; discordant to a subtle degree. But what I love is the overall tempo of the songs.

One thing Endstille does well is going for the throat and then pulling back to a more restrained beating. This is evident in “Jericho Howls” and the tortured victim of “Tochnit Aleph” a slow burning effigy before eruption happens. There are so many great moments on DetoNation, album number nine if you’re keeping track, and even though Navigator will always remain my favorite Endstille album, DetoNation has some of the heaviest songs I’ve heard since 2009’s Verführer, with tracks like “Vigilante Justice” and the massive as fuck closer “Endstille (Weltkrieg)”, DetoNation shows them at the top of their game, using a scorched earth policy to get the most out of their Black Metal attack.

At the end of the day, as the smoke clears this is a top-tier release, worthy of your undivided attention. If you love your Black Metal bloody raw, if you think Marduk, Infernal War, and God Dethroned are bands you’d invite to a BBQ, you’d better be inviting Endstille, as well. So, what are you waiting for? Constant reader, go forth and purchase.

Don’t panic, it’s not way different, but certainly, if you played both releases side by side, you be challenged to determine if they were the same band, but also that’s in a good way. Where Galdrum was a more raw, primal style of black metal mixed with extended dungeon synth moments that were more Abigor meets Mortiis, Tales Of Othertime is a far more fleshed out, polished, and traditional symphonic black metal effort more akin to some more obvious peers like early Emperor, Borknagar, Arcturus, Dimmu Borgir, and Ancient. 

But this development is for the better as the new, sweeping, majestic and still triumphant output is downright epic. With a cleaner sound from a whole new producer/mix/master crew, the sound is bigger and more ‘traditionally’ second wave symphonic black metal, which is certainly a benefit. The songs are now full of more full fantasy-driven symphonic elements as well as some clean vocals (with hints of Garm/ICS Vortex) and some almost Bal-Sagoth-like narration/spoken words carrying this tale of othertime along and a brisk, rousing pace. The rangy songs all have a killer entertaining pace and gait mixing swirling blast beats and mid-paced moments to catch your breath.

9-minute opener “The Seer” sets the tone pretty well with a nice mix of swirling frosty blasts and regal marches, all layered with stirring keys. However, the album really hits its stride at its midpoint with the 11 minute “A Journey Through Storms” which has a lovely little mid-song break, and the album standout, “The Serpent’s Stone” which has an excellent array of frenzied riffs leads and epic bridges. Aptly named closer “Eternal Majesty Manifest” rounds out the album and might be my favorite track with the clarion of battle (always a favorite) to start and a killer melodic blast, some rousing vocal breaks, and a perfectly epic ending crescendo.

My only minor quibble is that the incredibly entertaining album is only really 4 songs, with “The Citadel” and “An Ode to Dragons” being short Summoning-y instrumentals. That said the 4 actual songs are all over 8 minutes, but I selfishly just wanted MORE. Also, while the classic art from 80s art maven Les Edwards is fine, it’s tough to beat the Ian Miller artwork from the EP.

A rewarding trivia, when it comes to genres of music that become decentralized from their origin, eventually being represented throughout the world, is the geo-cultural specific micro variants that spawn and their unique differences, sometimes rather difficult to put one’s finger on.  A mystical brewing of production, chord progressions, tone, song writing, art, and harder-to-identify effects of style, can differentiate one city, region, or country from another. So then, what gives Greek black metal it’s metaphorical fingerprint?

Even as a novice of this style when I sampled a few tracks it was immediately noticeable.  Something about their Greek origin lends the sound a sense of authentic antiquity.  Greek production always sounds as if what you’re hearing was recorded in a limestone building, of a great age, turned studio.  From the outside, a weathered and long disused structure.  The rest which is hidden beneath a few meters of earth.  Traveling back more than 2,000 years the site is a temple and library containing artifacts that would fill a few gaps in modern contextual understanding of ancient Greek life. Greece at the time is the dominating culture of the Mediterranean, Lavant, and has a hold in Egypt.  Between them, a fascinating exchange of pre-Christian cultures representative in the painting used for the cover.  “A Christian Dirce” by Henryk Siemiradzki depicts Dirce, Queen of Thebes, being put to death.  Her body, tied to the horns and neck of a bull that kills her in its attempt to remove the burden from it’s crown. The precise synth string stabs introducing “Ceremonies Before Lights Existence” fitting for such a creatively violent spectacle.  Building into a definitively Greek style attack of riled programmed drums, dry serpentine guitar arrangement, pompous synth, and sand blasted straining of the throat.  High drama echoing up the stone auditorium collides with seething barbarism of foreign mercenaries.

This is also a time when gods played humanity like chess, for leisure.  From High society to common slave class, magic had a place.  The continuity of Greek cultural influence into modern times is singular.  Perhaps the most ancient with direct relevance today.  You hear this in Greek black metal.  That same through line to antiquity gives it a uniquely weathered sound.  Snare like nearby chiseling upon fresh stone columns.  Kick drum like thuds against dusty, taught goatskin.  Vocals that of a slave leading his fellows in offerings to a blended pantheon of gods and spirits under cover of night.  The whistle of winds driven off the Ionian Sea masking their congregation.  Fueled by resentment, against futility, offerings are made by the group in exchange for great hopes: the wellbeing of children not seen since being traded away, for the bloody end of traitors near, appeals for the healing of ripped heels, and lash marks. The riffs are as craggy and rugged as the rising landscape.  Weary as the gathered worshippers.  Momentary acoustic passages build like fire snarling in the dry salt air.  Melo-dramatic synth swells signify the presence of lower gods and djinn attracted by their call.

There’s an epic campiness to Zaratus’ music, and Greek black metal at large, which I think is naturally conflated due to the prominent, high arching synth and guitar melodies.  Although filled with synthetic instrumentation it misses any sword and sandal like corniness.  The group propels it’s melodramatic setting into something like that of an early 2000’s period film, closer to an underfunded Kingdom of Heaven would-be sequel in it’s production, than the overtly comic book exaggeration of CG box office hit 300.  Because, in fact, historical reality was both more incredible and terrible than fiction, once you dive into it.  As a follow up to ep The Descent the style is no different, but the production is wide screen, if you will.

At 48 minutes, the album is a bit long for my taste, but expected with historical epics.  However, where other albums feel like they drag on this album at least feels like it’s a complete musical arch with a well wrapped and exciting end in “Zoroastrian Priests”.  Arpeggio piano, and plinck-ed string accents spiral upward like fumes of burning acacia bush rising, encircled by robbed and painted priests, before finally lilting in the exhaustion of it’s frenzied appeal to the gods.  In the Days of Whore isn’t war metal, though it captures this sense of turn-of-the-first-millenium turmoil occurring throughout the exotic eastern Mediterranean.  Zaratus created an admirable record that successfully evokes  a time where human advancement gave way to great glory, and mystique but also great pain, and chaos.

If you’re like me and this is my first time around with these guys, quick backstory – The Ruins… is the brainchild of multi-instrumentalist and former Nagelfar drummer Alexander von Meilenwald. I am extremely late to this party, this being the project’s 6^th full-length studio album, but uh… better late than never, right? Right.

The total package of this album, put simply, is just not something I think I’ve quite ever heard before. Breaking it down, I’ve heard the individual elements before – but the sum of its parts is wholly a different experience than I can ever recall having with any other band or album. This in and of itself doesn’t mean it’s any good, of course, but I’m happy to say that this is REAL good. And real dark! It’s an oppressive, melodramatic lovechild of Rotting Christ, Emperor, Mortiis, Therion, Tiamat, Type-O-Negative, Godflesh, Today is the Day, Forgotten Tomb… honestly I could just keep naming bands for like 3 paragraphs, but the point is, there’s a lot of gloomy malcontent going into this soup, and the end result is as overwhelming as it is a joy to listen. The album kicks off with some eerie, repetitive feedback that sets an appropriate, if unsettling stage, before “Ropes into Eden” launches into some breakneck blasting layered with dreary, moth-ridden guitars and the occasional hit of war drums that, all put together, create an all-consuming torrent of sound and fury that is somehow extremely invigorating and totally draining at the same time. The song very suddenly takes an atmospheric break from the action that really shocks the senses and leaves you with a sense of anxiety-riddled unease. “What’s next?” you’ll ask yourself. “What’s creeping just around the corner ready to pounce?!” The songs draws things out for a few minutes, hitting you with a mix of Type-O/Summoning blackened doom, before bringing back the churning double bass and blackened blasts and ending the track in chaotic, senses-fraying fashion. It’s both a dreary and exhilarating ride!

The bleak overtones put into place on the opening track carry throughout the album, though with varying degrees of impending doom and despair. Even more driving moments like on “Polar Hiss Hysteria” or the back-half of “Mammothpolis” are hardly what you’d call “upbeat,” instead playing more like a crushing assault on your sensibilities – like the moment H.P. Lovecraft gets to the “oh fuck I’m losing my shit” part of the story. Indeed, much of the album brings the much-maligned godfather of cosmic horror to mind, with no shortage of moments of monastic-like chanting on tracks like “Kromlec’h Knell” and “Anchoress in Furs” that can be found with the likes of Lovecraft-superfans Sulphur Aeon or The Great Old Ones. Though the band’s name and central themes are actually rooted in Germanic mythology, it’s hard to deny that Lovecraftian feeling of existential crisis here (he obviously took his influences from mythos such as the ones presented here).

The Thule Grimoires is an all-consuming, unnerving listening experience that should bring a smile to anyone who prefers the darker, more macabre things in life. It is, admittedly, not the sort of thing I’d probably always be drawn to, and yet I’m very glad I did all the same. The dark days of winter are upon us – settle in and embrace the doom and gloom with The Ruins of Beverast.

“Totenzug – Funereal Hillscapes” a 6+ minute opener of a song begins with some atmospheric build-up that has me thinking of digging graves and a funeral procession.  It’s a very bleak intro until about 90 seconds in.  With a scorching eerie guitar riff, which has some black metal influence, and the deep vocals come in as the plodding heaviness erupts.  Drums are slow and this opening will have you thinking of doom/death metal, with its plodding and down-tuned heaviness.  Some nice guitar melodies before the song picks up the pace and the vocals are so damn deep, yet understandable and the guitars are ferociously heavy.  The guitars have an Asphyx influence to them and even some classic Bolt Thrower.  Some of the higher register raspy vocals work quite well and the speed of the song is classic 90’s death metal, but never getting into the blast beat territory.  After the song speeds up it gets back into a rumbling mid-paced heaviness.  Think Bolt Thrower gone doom/death – that is how damn heavy this song is.

“Sepulkrator” is up next and is 8 minutes with a massive opening guitar riff and the thunderous drums are seizure inducing.  The song plods and gets moving with some monolithically heavy riffing-this is some dense and heavy shit.  The monstrous vocals going perfectly to the dark theme of the album. The rhythm section at the 2.30 part is excellent so you can really feel that heaviness with a bottom end creating an undercurrent of heaviness most death metal bands wish they knew how to do.  The pained and anguished raspy vocals working quite excellently and around a minute later a little start n stop heavy riffing, before an old school faster beat comes in and then back into the plodding heaviness.  The 4.30 isolated guitar riff is killer as the higher growl comes in and then into a faster beat, as the song gets into a monster fast part the singer lets out a vintage Tom Warrior Celtic Frost like grunt circa 1984, as the speed continues.  This section is amazing and evil.

“Eremitorium” at 9 minutes ends the album with some blazing screeching guitars, some faster parts and then right back into the slower plodding heaviness.  Faster sections come in and then the Ulcerate-like swirling dissonant riffing rears its head and is complete madness.  The 3-minute atmospheric guitar parts, gets into a bit of epic heavy metal with the guitar soloing and brings a huge smile to my face.  Yes, we have seen some killer death metal German acts over the years incorporate some classic metal moments which are awesome – bands like Chapel of Disease really know how to incorporate that classic metal into their sound and so do Nekrovault.

The other songs are excellent, although “Serpentrance” is a 2-minute ambient style track, but it does fit with the overall flow of this album.  The production is very well done and captures the heaviness and the guitar density quite well so it does not come across as a wall of noise.  The album cover of Totenzug: Festering Peregrination is pure creepiness as the purple cover combined with the souls walking towards some temple conjures up an evilness that works incredibly well with Nekrovault’s pounding doom/death heaviness.  The band mixes in enough tempo changes to really keep the listener engaged.  This album came out of nowhere, knocked me on my ass and was one of the very best for 2020.  Like their FB page and support this great new act.

Though only 4 songs and the fourth, “Lost in Mystic Woods and Cursed Hollows”, being a dungeon synth-y instrumental, the 3 songs are 6 -10 minutes respectively, so you get 30 minutes of damn good stuff here.

Other than the artwork, Orkblut is also a pretty solid musical comparison, ( and maybe France’s Abduction and Véhémence as well) as this is blistering, fantasy-based , melodic but raw black metal with swirling medieval keyboards and a little medieval chamber music/dungeon synth/monkish chants bits here and there.

10 minute opener “Glass Caverns of the Dragon Kings” starts with a little Mortiis (a definite influence on the band’s interludes and instrumental bits)-y jaunt before exploding with a blistering, icy cold blast that has Epoch of Unlight levels of percussive fury. The little mid-song acoustic sway and subsequent melodic blast a 6:50 is to die for, recalling “The Rising of Our Tribe” from Orkblut. The second track the 6 minute, “Lightning Frost”, start with a fucking rousing blast before settling into a more mid paced but no less stirring track.

The EPs best cut (though all of them are amazing), is another 10 minute number,  “Of Lore”, with a flutey/acoustic intro and not one, but two absolutely stunning riff; one about 5:30 in and the second after a short orchestral bridge around 7 and a half minutes in, and it’s one of y favorite melodic black metal/symphonic crescendos of the year. And yes, it ends with a war/battle sample … perfect.

Easily my favorite EPs/MLPs of 2020 so far, and I can’t wait to see what a hopefully forthcoming full-length delivers.

However, Morbus Chron were here one moment, gone the next. Horrendous picked up that torch and ran with it. However, this review isn’t about Death, Morbus Chron, or Horrendous. This is about Sweven and their debut, The Eternal Resonance. So, why the extended intro? Well, Sweven is the new band led by Robert Andersson of Morbus Chron. Just looking at the band name, I’m sure, dear reader, you are astute enough to have drawn some sort of lineage. I’m proud of you.

You probably know what to expect, at least a little, from this album, but I am going to tell you my thoughts anyway. Firstly, I think the production deserves a mention. Before even getting into the music, this record is pristine, yet punchy. It’s clean, modern, and somehow also sounds analog. It’s beautifully played, recorded, and captured. Well done. Now, onto the music.

Brutal, slamming, heavy. None of those adjectives apply here. When the intro, “The Spark” begins, one immediately notices the cleanliness in the production, but also the instrumentation (is that a mandolin?). The intro keeps building as I am preparing my pants to be soiled. Then, track 2, the first proper track, “By Virtue of a Promise” begins. It takes nearly another 2 minutes before we finally hear some throat shredding vocals courtesy of main man Robert Andersson. The dynamics already on display less than a full two tracks in cannot be overstated. If you hear a better guitar/bass production, I implore you to make me aware. As a (terrible) guitar player, I have always had an affinity for being able to hear the guitarist’s hands moving along the fret board, perhaps because it brings a human element to the music. The recording on this album is so pristine, I can hear this in the picking on “By Virtue Of A Promise.” This track changes shape so many times in its 9-minute runtime, going from somber and mellow to galloping and heavy multiple times over. One full track in and I am swooning. Someone fetch me a fan for I have the vapors.

Track 3 is the next number in this already persistently evolving mammoth. Coming in at a downright radio-friendly 7 minutes (compared to the previous track), “Reduced To An Ember” is another slow burn, progressive monster with some keyboards thrown in the mix, but I believe the next song, “The Sole Importance,” has a little more going for it. About 5 minutes into the track, one can feel the build into a fantastic solo that’s honestly just a bit too short. Yeah, the song is over 8 minutes long and I feel like a part of it is too short. With a little over a minute left, another lead takes over (but it’s not a hair whipping solo), which lasts until the end of the song.

Track 5, “Mycelia,” is desperation in audio form. With the clean guitar, the quick snare hits (and even some blast beats) thrown in underneath, for 5 minutes of the runtime, I feel like this song just has something it needs to get off its chest… NOW! However, after that time elapses, everything calms down, and it goes all the way until what I can only describe as a jazzy outro.

Let’s skip ahead a little bit to the last track on the album, which is “Sanctum Sanctorum.” Here we have an 8 and ½ minute track, which is mostly instrumental. Entirely instrumental if you disregard the chanting. Usually, a track with this runtime and no vocals would do nothing for me. I’d disregard it and skip it when it comes on just to get to the end of the album faster. That does not occur here as I feel like it adds to the album, and is therefore a perfect ending.

I hesitate to call anything “transcendental.” So, I won’t. This album is frequently progressive, rock, even “instru-metal.” In other words, it may often be considered not metal. If not for the vocals, this could hardly be called “death metal.” Instead, to put a label on it, I suppose we go with “progressive death metal.” It’s difficult to put this album into words, even though I have certainly committed many to it. My only complaint is that it might be just a bit too long. At 8 tracks and slightly over an hour long, despite the fact this album is consistently engaging, moving, and evolving, listening can be a bit tiring. However, to be honest, I have a poor attention span, and anything over 40 minutes when it comes to an album tends to get me checking to see if it’s over. This, however, is a minor complaint. I was a fan of this album from the first listen. While every song seamlessly flows into the next and there is a clear “sound” to the album, every track is also vital to its execution. Cutting one song. Hell, even one minute would be tragic.

I think this is the part where I am supposed to come up with some metaphor as to how you should let this album wrap itself around you like a cocoon of some sort, or maybe even a weighted blanket. I’m too mature for that. Instead, what I will say is that you should curl up with this album during the quarantine, let it touch your nether regions, and try not to fall in love.

Whereas the debut had some subtle melody amid the massive churn, the follow up seemed to lose that, but on  The Scythe of Cosmic Chaos, the band has again added some sneaky melody and also, some underhanded grandiosity and immensity to the already vastly massive album. Also, the addition of some well used occult chants and clean chants adds to the austere, regal filth on display.

Some may scoff at the clean chants and croons, but they are used to good effect when used in conjunction with the pummeling but crafty harmonic chaos of the Lovecraftian based death metal. Opener “Cult of Starry Wisdom” immediately introduced you to the hypnotic chants and ritualistic clean vocals and ends with a supine melodic lead that collides with the cataclysmic death metal. The second track, “Yuggothian Spell” as if to cement the band can simply bring the pain at will delivers the album most direct brutal track (along with “The Oneironaut”), before the rest of the album takes you into a stargazing spiral into paranoia and madness.

Whereas many Lovecraftian albums are content to simply focus on filth and muck by way of atonal, dissonant overload, Sulphur Aeon along with say, The Great Old Ones, are able to blend the vast evil majesty of the Ancient Ones and the cosmos with the murkier, dripping, writhing horror you’d expect. For example, the dense, majesterial march and starry melodic lead of third track “The Summoning of Nyarlathotep”, blackened menace of ” Veneration of the Lunar Orb”,  the album’s patient, harrowing, 9-minute, tentacled,  centerpiece “Sinister Sea Sabbath” or dreamy closer “Thou Shalt Not Speak His Name (The Scythe of Cosmic Chaos)”, which ends the album on a perfect, dulcet summoning ritual, a nice endnote to the prior 40 minutes of controlled chaos and yet another album on my year end list.

Recently, the likes of Vattnet Viskar, Ghost Bath, Downfall of Nur,  Alda, Soar, Wiegedood,   Ahamkara, Panopticon, Woods of Desolation, Vallendusk, Winterfylleth, Fen, Obsequiae and such have taken the frosty sneer  and satanism out of black metal and added an intrinsic elegance and dare I say new age, peaceful aura to the genre. And one of my favorite releases of the style this year, along with Alda’s Passage and the recent Obsequiae , is the debut from London’s Crom Dubh. A London band with ties to Craven Idol and Scythian, named after a Celtic deity? You bet.  And it’s magnificent.

With and airy but  fuzzed out guitar tone, the requisite distant black metal rasps , and delicately strummed bass, Heimweh (‘homesick’), isn’t the sharpest or most commanding record on the block, but it’s steeped in an organic, but crisp beauty, like a brisk, dew soaked Irish morning. The riffs have an air of somber Primordial-ish, Celtic-ness and craggy grandeur colliding with Cascadian peak majesty are restrained, and littered with expected melodic crescendos and ambient bridges.

It’s the kind of black metal that kult and trve black metal archetypes are going to despise, as it screams out hipster or post black metal to the casual metal/black metal fan, But its a deep, introspective release with themes and hues of Celtic/Saxon history and imagery, not unlike Winterfylleth or Wodesnthrone’s historical leanings. The albums 6 main tracks (along with 3 interludes), contain somber, but bright shimmery riffs that seem to have been written to be played on bagpipes, and echoing though the green valleys of the emerald isle, as heard on the almost nine minute “Sedition”, .

The standout title track, has the album’s most alluring riff with  engaging, shrill, layered melodic hums and the pace shift at 3:25 to the track’s close is just downright gorgeous and worth the price of the album alone. Closer “Sailing to Byzantium” is the album’s most standard, ‘pure’ black metal track ending the album on a more direct note showing that Crom Dubh can crank it up a little when they want to. But the heart of the album is the aforementioned Irish tinged majesty and post rock shimmer coming together to form something  that is at time pretty damn special.

I’m not sure I can remember a follow-up to such a critically-acclaimed album get so little buzz or hype, but having owned the album since it came out, I can see why. First off, Gateway to the Antisphere has been crushed by the weight of its predecessor. Second, it’s not nearly as an immediate album. Where Swallowed… mixed some very subtle melodies into the churning Maveth/Immolation/Vorum sound, Gateway… seems to be going for a much more purely dissonant and discordant palette, almost forcibly so, reaching almost-Abyssal levels of claustrophobic noise.

Everything else is in place though, from the stellar artwork (this thing comes in a GORGEOUS package), the crumbling yet crisp guitar tone, cavernous vocals, and Lovecraftian themes and lyrics. But something is missing, and it’s that something that made the debut so good. Sure, there are oodles of those twisty, murky riffs and a few very impressive lurches, such as the closing of “Devotion to the Cosmic Chaos” or “Calls from Below.” These are staples of the style and sound, and here offer an even murkier, frothing miasma, but it’s far from the attention-grabber that the debut was.

BUT…… Gateway to the Antisphere is the very definition of a grower. It takes a while to truly click, as here we are in July and I’m just now starting to really feel the album’s horrific, moist clutches. “Diluvial Ascension – Gateway to the Antisphere”, “He is the Gate” and the monstrous “Seventy Steps” eventually sucked me in and pulled me under the surface. The pure vortices of “Onwards to Kadath” and “Abysshex,”  and a couple of atmospheric bookends keep the album’s pacing from getting too mired in huge churning dissonance, but still I can’t help but think there is just something missing from the overall body of the album. Still, as the year wears on, I can see Gateway slithering up my year-end list as its layers unfurl and continue to seep into my nightmares.

First off, before I even get to the music, this double CD is packaged in a gorgeous embossed case with detailed lyrics and artful medieval writings, so it has a book feel, from the Norse eddas, detailing the various stories and histories of the time taken from various recovered texts and excavations. And those lyrics themselves are sung entirely in Old Norse-Icelandic, with added Skaldic verses from the Icelandic sagas., making Aldafǫðr ok munka dróttinn a sonic, historical document detailing Iceland’s conversion to Christianity in the 1st century, not just a musical album. You’ll be hard pressed to find a more authentic or detailed record as this outside of  this or the band’s equally as  astounding back catalog.

The music contained on the 2 discs is equally as ambitious and deep. Using rangy, progressive and patient mid era Enslaved -ish black and traditional folk metal as the backbone, the 9 song , 80 minute affair is not easy to digest. At its forefront is the effective and brilliant use of baritone ‘wiking’ choirs that are simply stunning. They remind me of  a deeper version of Heidevolk’s vocal duo or a bunch of J. Lohngrin Cremonese’s, who sang clean vocals on Old Man’s Childs second  album, The Pagan Prosperity, (namely “The Millennium King”). Throw in some austere spoken words as some standard black metal rasps, and the vocal performance is varied and top notch.

And it’s when the band deliver these epic, majestic and somber choirs, orchestration and introspective moments where the album truly shines, taking you back in time like some sonic Jorvik museum tour, where you can smell the crackling fires and feel the chill of the Icelandic air. Whether it’s the albums opening windswept throes of and strings of the 12 minute “Kastar heljar brenna fjarri ofan Ǫnundarfirðinum”, mid section of “Þeir heilags dóms hirðar” , start of “Úlfs veðrit er ið CMXCIX” or somber closing of “Sem lengsk vánar lopts ljósgimu hvarfs dregr nærri”.

And these moments actually end up being somewhat of a pitfall for this release. They are so alluring, epic and elegant that the regular bursts of ‘normal’ black metal take a bit of a back seat, being simply overshadowed. Not that they are a forgotten element or a afterthought, but I’m not coming back to this album over and over again to hear the competently played and written form of crisp, clean black metal that starts “Norðsæta gætis, herforingja Ormsins langa” or “Bituls skokra benvargs hreggjar á sér stað” (though both still containing gorgeous moments), as the riffs really aren’t that memorable or classic, simply solid on their frosty Norwegian throes (along with Enslaved, Helrunar is a decent starting point, riff wise).  I’m coming to hear expansive, atmospheric sonic poetry and the historic majesty of “Tími er kominn at kveða fyrir þér”. But when all elements are taken as a whole and the album is absorbed in its entirety, with complete focus and attention to every living breathing note, lyrics and detail, its truly special.

Though officially released in December of 2014, the album sees a full international repress early in 2015 ( along with the band’s back catalog) that ensures Aldafǫðr ok munka dróttinn will sit somewhere atop my 2015 year end list and a future landmark, arguably seminal release  as well as a historical reference for generations to come.

Blood Vaults is the clearest, heaviest, slowest, most melancholy album that mastermind Alexander von Meilenwald has ever created, making it fall squarely within the realm of death/doom. Evoken, Disembowelment, and even a Bizarro World Virgin Black come to mind for comparison. I don’t mean to get hung up on genre tags, but continuing to refer to this act as black metal would be misleading at this point. Even the vocals are at their deepest, most resembling those of early Amorphis than anything remotely blackened. However, that’s not to say the project has lost its originality or became more straightforward in any way. This is a sprawling, meditative, slow burn of an album that demands many listens with headphones in a dark room to fully appreciate. At nearly an hour and twenty minutes in length, that isn’t always an easy task, but it’s a rewarding one.

As you probably have guessed from the subtitle, this is a concept album with lyrics from the twisted perspective of Heinrich Kramer, the fifteenth century German inquisitor and primary author of the infamous treatise on the prosecution of witches, the Malleus Maleficarum. Church organs and choir samples provide a sense of dark religious zeal befitting the theme. Even though the general tempo is plodding, the degree is varied and punctuated with waves of aggression. A big one of those waves comes early when second track, “Daemon,” hits like a tsunami of churning guitars and thundering drums after the calm but ominous intro, “Apologia.” Another is the steady high speed of the relatively brief, “Ordeal,” and almost every other track includes some bouts of controlled, grinding rage. Nevertheless, doom is truly the dominant force here. The guitars — more upfront and thicker than ever before — bear most of the burden as they strain out emotional chords and melodies that bring to mind early My Dying Bride and Anathema in tracks like the aforementioned “Malefica” and funereal closer “Monument.” And, if you still have any doubts about the true nature of this beast, they’ll certainly be squelched by the massive, droning riffs and slow-marching drums of “Spires, The Wailing City” and “A Failed Exorcism.” The atmospheric clean guitar and synthesized chanting layered over the much of the album only add to the aura of doomed misery, but Meilenwald’s memorable, chanted, clean vocals of the previous two albums are surprisingly minimal this time around. Other surprises await in the gloom, but I don’t want to completely spoil your own personal exploration of this massive recording.

In the liner notes of the Enchanted by Gravemould comp, Meilenwald referred to My Dying Bride’s “Symphonaire Infernus et Spera Empyrium” as “the ultimately malicious and sinister opera of the Deathdoom Genre.” It seems that his admiration has spilled over into emulation on Blood Vaults. Fans of his frostier side might find this disappointing, but if they give this a fair chance, they’ll realize that a black heart still lurks within; it’s just beating with heavier force.

Faal (Dutch for “fail”) hail from one-time death/doom hotbed, the Netherlands, and include a member from that scene’s heyday in its ranks (William Nijhof of Spina Bifida handles vocals). Their debut, Abhorrence-Salvation, was released back in ‘08, but sold out so quickly, I was never able to get my hands on a copy. So, I can’t make any comparisons to their past material. But, considering how great this is, I think it’s safe to say that they haven’t succumbed to the infamous sophomore slump. Their style is rooted in the oppressive and atmospheric variety of death/doom spearheaded by bands like Esoteric, Disembowelment, and Dusk (US), but with a slight blackgaze influence in the form of some lighter, shimmery tremolo guitar work and blackened vocals. I’ve seen the now-popular “funeral” tag being thrown their way, but anyone who thinks this fits that description should give Thergothon another listen.

The opening track, “My Body Glows Red,” begins with distant, mysterious ambience and clean guitar picking that evokes the feeling of floating out in deep space until you’re abruptly brought back down to earth by a sudden explosion of crushing doom. The intensity soon escalates with the addition of rapid double-bass drums and tremolo guitars. The bottom drops out halfway through and the spacey ambience and clean guitar returns for a moment before the band explodes again with even more intensity and a heart-rending melody that’s amplified by the chaos beneath it. It’s a strong opening and a good representation of what’s to come. This interplay of anger and melancholy, harsh and soft, flows throughout the entire album, but it’s ever-changing. At times, the two are separate; at others, they merge into powerful crescendos. This is most evident in “The Insistence’s Wish,” which starts off slow and deliberate, but eventually erupts into a grinding segment followed by emotional synths and fragile guttural vocals (if that makes sense) until everything explodes into the most dramatic and emotional climax of the year with wailing guitars, crashing drums, deep growls, and ghostly, chant-like vocals. The third track, “Tempest,” immediately erupts into a heavy gallop akin to My Dying Bride’s “Under Your Wings and into Your Arms,” but soon slows to hateful plodding reminiscent of Esoteric’s best moments. The title track closes the album with a somber intro that leads to more pissed heaviness until it’s all overwhelmed at the very end by harsh noise that sounds like you’re being flushed down the cosmic drainpipe.

No one approach is repeated or overstays its welcome, which makes the 45-minute playing time fly by. And, therein lies the album’s most notable flaw: it feel’s slightly short, especially since it’s comprised of only four tracks. This is the first time I’ve ever felt like an album could actually use some filler. One or two brief instrumentals between the main tracks could’ve made the album feel more complete. Another minor issue is the production. It could afford to sound a little more full and clear, but I’m really digging for criticisms at this point.

It’s great to see this style finally gaining some ground this year thanks to the lauded works of Evoken, Inverloch, and Indesinence. I just hope that this unique and compelling take on it doesn’t fall through the cracks.

The album has a dark and moody vibe all the way through the album but again it’s so subtly done its brilliant by being so restrained and calm. “Christ or Cocaine” is one of my favorite tracks and embodies the vibe of Anne Wilson but F. also knows how to make it her own “House of 1000 Voices” is another great track that combines horror with rock and roll. You can envision a bunch of hippies in a haze of smoke after a night of blood-sacrificing rituals listening to this. The guitar melodies are all spot on, never really slows down, all up tempo and keeps the listener’s attention. “Angel’s Prayer” is classic Thin Lizzy; you can’t really miss it when you hear the guitar tracks right before F.’s vocals come in. Again, none of these tracks really hit heavy metal status, let alone black metal status so if you’re used to or expecting something with more intensity this will probably bore you if you’re not paying close attention.

A lot of seventies rock and hard rock have all gotten a bad rap but I highly advise that you do not pass off “The Time of No Time Evermore”. It’s like if Grace Slick, Rob Zombie, Jim Morrison, and Charles Manson all had a chance to get together at one time; this is what they would have created. The viciousness of the lyrics combined with F. the Mouth of Satan’s melody is eerie, haunting, and incredible. You definitely want to check this one out!

There are actually two sounds at work here – in its more frenzied moments, Inarborat conjures the frosty blizzard-riffs and blastbeats of classic Norwegian acts like Enslaved or Immortal. And when they slow down to a more mysterious, somber pace, the mood recalls the romantic stirrings of Drudkh, Wildhoney-era Tiamat and yes, Inarborat‘s Romanian namesake. Some of the melodies are actually quite lovely, as on “Schwingenbruch” or “The Brook Lies Silent.”

There’s little ornamentation to be had here – a lone acoustic interlude on one track and some chiming, Burzum-ish tones on the lengthy “Wisdom Sans Words” – meaning that the songs’ ability to craft a mood rely on composition and melody alone. The hoarse, raspy German vocals are mostly buried under the guitars, and the already harsh edges of that language lend a distinctive sense of menace to the mood.

As with a lot of pure, classic black metal, repetition plays a key part in the experience, so that the album can sometimes drift away at times. Those looking for a riveting, start-to-finish listen may find their attention wandering, but I didn’t find this to be a problem. Sometimes what you want is just to zone out into that uniquely contemplative black metal headspace.

There’s nothing remotely original going on here, but it is spitefully done and typically grim, with a tinny, but not grating sound that plies your expected Mark/Darkthrone inspired hymns of war, anti Christianity, disdain for all life and general unpleasantness. I have heard better (almost all their Scandinavian peers) and I’ve heard worse (country mates Torch of War).

The guitar tone is brittle yet clear and the rhythm section, though light has a presence that fits within the framework of the genre. More importantly, there are some decent (if par for the course), grazing, yet everso slightly melodic, tremolo picked riffs here that will keep most black metal fans happy; “Ad Arma” (with its thrashy mid section), “Crucify (The Scum)”, restrained march of “Interitus Christianorum” with a nice classical/orchestral bridge into the blazing “Welt In Flammen” (though I could do without the air raid sirens.

More cool, dramatic Germanic orchestration starts “Possessed by Sinister Spirits” and “Spill the Blood of Christ”, breaking up the whole sense of déjà vu that permeates the last third of the album that prevents it from being more than a middle tier, competent black metal act act. No more, no less.

With a tangible influence of The Ruins of Beverast in the plodding, moody tones and to these ears, a hint of Summoning in the deliberate percussion, Verdunkeln (meaning ‘to darken’) is a solid, if overdrawn affair (the songs range from 6 -17 minutes) that will appeal to fans of the burgeoning atmospheric /ambient black metal genre.

With a thicker than usual production, especially in the rhythm section, Verdunkeln rasp, whisoer, wail, mope and lope through 6 lengthy tracks of blackened doomy despondency, with the only the very occasional injection of urgency. The thing is it never really becomes transcendental or truly bores into your psyche as The Ruins of Beverast. The ambient elements seem an afterthought, and the atmosphere is never as suffocating as their peers. In the albums later stages the pace of the virtually doom styled gait becomes more of a bore than a journey into despondent realms.

Luckily, the second track, “Im Zweispalt”, at 15 minutes is the albums highlight with the most oppressive hues and despondent atmosphere of the album, but unfortunately its followed by the awkward stomping gait of “Der Quell”, which really breaks up the mood, as does the initial pace of next track, “Die Saat Der Klinge”, but it does eventually veer into a pretty crushing doom styled lurch. And that’s about where my attention wanes. The 17-minute “De Herrscher” mixes wandering and whispers with a few more not quite so well done mid paced passages before waning to a more expected ambience plod in its final few minutes.

The ending chant of closer “Auf Freiem Felde”, cements comparisons to The Ruins of Beverast and Summoning, but as of right now Verdunkeln are a little ways from that level of brilliance, but this sis still a release to check out for fans of this style.