“Being a black metal fan entails crankiness. It seems there are more critics and black metal TSA waiting in the wings than any other metal subgenre, just lurking, waiting to hit each new album with a slap of humility – some of it deserved, some of it not. No one’s ever happy, as no release will be raw enough, noisy enough, unlistenable enough, “they have a Facebook and a Bandcamp and don’t exclusively sell cassettes, are you fucking kidding me.”” The fine line between hate and kvlt hate.
“The band sport a Mitochondrion or Adversarial styled take on death/black metal with a thrashy assault-heavy relentlessness combined with eldritch melodies and passages of doomy ominousness. These New Zealanders laid it on thick with 2012’s double LP The Obsidian Codex, expertly balancing relentless blackened death with ritualistic atmosphere and dense doom to create an experience that felt far shorter than its immense hour-and-thirty-five-minute runtime suggested. Enter 2017’s Malediction, which wasn’t… that. While offering a “shorter” listen at fifty-four minutes, it never managed to truly escape the doomy drudgery and wallowed in uneventfulness for nearly an hour. Enter 2020’s To the Death.” Death be not quick.
“Industrial black metal has not boded well in 2020, with groups like American snoozers T.O.M.B. and Dutch painmongers Ulveblod earning some of the lowest ratings I’ve awarded during my tenure. Dkharmakhaoz’s Proclamation ov the Black Suns, blessedly, is extremely well-written and densely punishing second-wave foray into atmospherics that never neglects its highlights.” Black sunshine.
“Quebecois trio Shezmu, formed in 2016, already sports a startup of two EPs and a demo compilation, ultimately culminating in their first full-length, À Travers Les Lambeaux. I hesitate to label the project, because if there existed a Venn diagram of black, death, and doom, it would be smack dab in the middle.” Extremity buffet.
“If I say the magic words “space-themed death metal,” what do you see? If you see Blood Incantation or Artificial Brain come swooping in like a half-giant on a flying motorcycle, push your disappointment to the back of your mind, because we ain’t talking about them today.” Sxuspend expectations.
“Anyone familiar with France’s one man black/death weirdo project Esoctrilihum knows that primary member Asthâghul is the kind of singularly driven musician who can’t help but vomit out an hour-plus album of eccentric, labyrinthine darkness every 12 months or less. While some in the underground metalverse have praised his output since day one, our own coverage has been a bit more tepid. Does fifth full-length Eternity of Shaog change that trend?” Elder Gods Drinking Crew.
“Wolves Den, a German blackened death quartet, unleashed an unsung monster of a record back in 2015 named Deus Vult. While it wasn’t genre-defining or anything like that, I often question why it gets such little fanfare. Perhaps with their sophomore full-length, Miserere, they can establish some kind of foothold in the heart-voids of our fair metal community.” Misery loves running with the pack.
“I found Dawn of Ouroboros out walking after midnight through the Bandcamp grounds, and while I may have ultimately been hauled back to my angry metal prison in a most silverback-ed and unceremonious fashion, you can bet your sorry ass that I managed to smuggle the Californians’ debut back with me. You’re welcome.” Muppet Mythos.
“Having been raised in church, I found my religious experience carried over into my vast expeditions into metal’s colorful multiverse: I find myself reaching more and more for the stuff that incorporates a unique tone of reverence, a sound of standing beneath the colossal or infinite. For bands like Batushka, Ancient Moon, and Behemoth, this liturgical and hieratic atmosphere is proposed through its ritualistic songwriting and uses of common religious musical elements (Gregorian chants, choirs, etc.) contrasting with blasphemy’s twisted dagger in an aural representation of madness. Sonne Adam’s death/doom solo LP Transformation did this for me.” Worship music.
“Endless Wound is so singular in its focus, so confident in its ability to do one thing extremely fucking well, that any convoluted preamble would be far too indulgent. So, convoluted, indulgent preamble aside, I will simply say this: Endless Wound feels like a future death metal classic.” Black curse, bold words.
