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Morast – Fentanyl Review

By Steel Druhm

I knew absolutely nothing of German blackened death-doom act Morast, but the promo description intrigued me and made me want to seize the means of review for their third album, Fentanyl. What I got for my troubles was the experience of being smashed into bloody jelly while simultaneously being suffocated by unspeakable evil and darkness. Fentanyl is a nihilistic nightmare of an album, crushingly heavy, unrelenting, and overloaded with oppressive atmospheres and existential dread. As caustic as the name implies, this hellish, dissonant soundscape borrows from acts like The Ruins of Beverast, Ulcerate, and vintage Behemoth, but it’s a unique monstrosity that wants to hurt you badly.

Opener “Of Furor and Ecstacy” wastes no time burning down your comfort zone with crawling, slithering abominations of sound as riffs lurch and ooze all over you before they start cracking bones to get at the marrow within. Ex-Nagelfar vocalist Zingultus roars and cackles insanely like someone possessed by a demonic entity, and his crazed, unsettling verbalizations recall Attila Csihar’s work on De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. The riffs from J. Slug are insanely raw, crushing, and dissonant, scouring and abrading your nerve endings even as they piledriver you into the muddy earth. This is the sound of the comfortable world around you coming apart at the seams. “Aratron” continues to hammer at your sanity with massively inexorable riffs that pulverize all before them. If a song could break the heaviness scale, this is it. You need to hear this to appreciate just how monolithic it feels. Little bits of bleak post-y term work eventually leak in to add grim adornments and darken the mood as Zingultus uses deep, baritone cleans to impart an unnerving ritualistic vibe to the horror show. It’s all done so well that it becomes unnaturally gripping and inescapable.

Over the short but uniformly savage 34-minute runtime, Fentanyl delivers one sadistic beatdown after another. There’s a certain one-note flavor to the torture parade but within the meatgrinder, you’ll encounter a subtle variety of blades. “Walls Come Closer” is less dizzyingly chaotic, focusing on a grinding doom plod with vaguely melodic lines floating outside the abrasive riffs. “A Thousand and More” adopts the same formula but ratchets everything up for a grand flattening of reality via ginormous riffs and twisted vocals. Colossal closer “On Pyre” primes the pump with droning, disso leads, and sprinkles Behemoth-esque bits of grandiose bombast throughout its nearly 8-minute slog. It’s a wild ride but it could stand some trimming as things get a touch monotonous towards the end. Bloat exists on other cuts as well, but here it’s the most noticeable. The relative brevity of the album is a blessing, as much more of this kind of material would truly be too much to bear. The production is dense, oppressive, and suffocating, creating a genuine sense of claustrophobia. Unfortunately, there are weird glitches in the sound at times where the volume drops abruptly before eventually resetting. I’m hoping it’s a promo issue rather than an album problem because that would be a shame.

The fiends behind Fentanyl are well-traveled vets with lots of time in the trenches. J. Slug’s riffs and “harmonies” are the reason the album delivers such a massive impact. The man creates absolute horrors on his fretboard, triggering real feelings of anxiety, dread, and terror. Adding to the discomfort, Zingultus goes all in vocally, blending black and death tropes to destabilize the mind. He often sounds deranged and fanatical, lending the material an extra sense of volatility. Some of his lines sound pathologically insane, and he even verges on vomiting sounds on a few occasions during this vocal tour de force. Leonardo Bardelle absolutely smashes his kit into assdust but offers rare moments of calm restraint that make the harder moments all the more shocking and disruptive. A great performance by all involved.

Fentanyl is not an album to relax with on a quiet winter evening or to nod along to on your daily commute. This is the sound of a descent into Hell. You will be tested, tortured, and terrorized in equal measure. I got a lot more than I bargained for on this one, and Morast left a deep impression on my brain stem. Fentanyl falls just shy of greatness, but you should schedule a time to be brutalized by this thing ASAP. You know you deserve it for that awful thing you did.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Ván Records
Websites: facebook.com/officialmorast | instagram.com/morast_doom
Releases Worldwide: February 7th, 2025

#2025 #35 #Behemoth #BlackMetal #DeathMetal #DoomMetal #Feb25 #Fentanyl #GermanMetal #Morast #Nagelfar #Review #Reviews #TheRuinsOfBeverast #Ulcerate #VanRecords

Árstíðir lífsins – Aldrlok Review

By Twelve

Árstíðir lífsins seem to not believe much in fanfare. Since I discovered the Icelandic/German group via their very good fourth full-length Saga á tveim tungum I: Vápn ok viðr, I never learn about their releases until AFTER they show up. The followup to Saga I never reached the Angry Metal Promo Sump, and their most recent release, the enjoyable Hermalausaz, arrived quietly at the end of last year. Now they’re back with Aldrlok (“Death [of an age]”), their sixth full-length release, which follows the band’s familiar vein of mountainous black metal adorned with gorgeous folk passages and lyrics sung in Old Norse-Icelandic. It’s a super-potent combo, and these guys have the smarts to back up their premise, so how does that translate into eighty-three minutes of music?

Compared with recent releases, Aldrlok is familiar territory. This time around, the riffs feel heavier (“Stormr, hvítundit grand gundar gjálfrs”) and the orchestrations are more elaborate (“Er faðir kulda ok myrkrs hopar fyrir endalausum vegi Ránar”), creating a strong melodic black metal feel for the album. Of course, it’s as folky as ever, in that Old Norse sort of way that Árstíðir lífsins excel at. Marsél, credited as ever as the band’s storyteller, provides deep, intoning singing, guttural narrations (to superb effect on “Nú er lengstu miskunndir dalreyðar ná hátindi”), and vicious black metal rasps, while frequent acoustic and orchestral passages break up the black metal assaults provided by Stefán (guitars and bass) and Árni (percussion and string instruments) (both of whom also provide vocals). The sound is elaborate, dense, and well done. Aldrlok is the sound of a band that knows exactly what they are doing.

This also means that the strongest and coolest element of Aldrlok is the storytelling. The album tells a tale semi-mythological fiction, taking place in Iceland around 1040, during a period of societal upheaval, and borrows material from Skaldic and Eddic poetry. Through their music, Árstíðir lífsins transport the listener back in time. The album opener, “Hvítir hjǫrvar Heimdalls aldraðra fjallgylða,” takes the listener on a journey, opening slowly with deep chants that make way for passages of solemn vocal melody that evoke a great tale about to begin. When the black metal arrives, it does so climactically, being built up to grandiosity by a band that is more than happy to take its time. From here, the song—and indeed, the album—does a great job of balancing black metal, melody, and folk. “Nauð greyprs élreka” does the best job of striking this balance. A band with a keyboardist could certainly mimic the style, but Aldrlok asks: “why do with a keyboard what you could do with your own voices?” Suitably, the close of the song, where massive black metal riffing gives way to solemn, near-reverent chanting, is one of the best moments, not only on this album but on any Árstíðir lífsins release to date.

Of course, some will be put off by the lengths of both the individual songs on Aldrlok and the length of the whole. Nine songs covering eighty-three minutes is a lot of music. I do wish the mix and production favored the metal elements more, as they tend to be muted. I’m sure it’s a stylistic choice, but it’s hard not to think that more prominence for the drumming and a touch less distortion on the guitars could net a really heavy album in the vein of a contemporary like Mistur. On the other hand, the grand length of the album contributes to its “Norse epic” feel, emulating the poetry it’s based on. The long songs that often flow into one another create the feeling of a mythology told in two parts (“Nú er lengstu miskunndir dalreyðar ná hátindi” breaks up the album expertly, and is a terrific dark folk song), and while it is a lot to take in all at once, there aren’t any actual weak spots on Aldrlok.

Árstíðir lífsins are consistently releasing interesting, well-researched, and very good black metal. I would argue that Aldrlok is their strongest yet, but it will be very familiar to you if you’re a fan of their recent work. It takes you back into the past in a way that most art struggles to do, and continues to fill a unique space in the world of metal. It demands a certain mood, but if you’re in it, this album will bring you back in time.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Ván Records
Websites: arstidirlifsins.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/arstidirlifsins
Releases Worldwide: May 31st, 2024

#2024 #35 #Aldrlok #ArstidirLifsins #BlackMetal #FolkMetal #GermanMetal #IcelandicMetal #May24 #Mistur #Review #Reviews #VanRecords

Attic – Return of the Witchfinder Review

By Dr. A.N. Grier

Mmmmmm… King Diamond-core. It’s been seven years since Attic delivered its top-form masterpiece, Sanctimonious. And now, They’re back again to ensure I’m erect for the remainder of the year. This new record continues the trend the band has been on even before Kim Bendix Petersen was but a wily sperm in his father’s nutsack. Delivering no-frills, old-school Satanic heavy metal, this German quintet combines soaring falsettos, creepy organs, and Mercyful Fate-esque dueling guitar work to shape yet another hour’s worth of music. If you’ve followed the band since their 2012 debut, The Invocation, you’ll find nothing new on this year’s Return of the Witchfinder. But, that’s ok because it’s more about the performance and overall concept of their releases that keep me coming back for more. But, we all want to see if this new record can top their previous effort. Will the Witchfinder be worthy enough to stiffen Grier‘s trouser snake?

If anything, Return of the Witchfinder sports even more nifty guitar leads and dueling action than before. This is probably due in part to a new guitarist joining the fold. As lovers of all that is KD, it only makes sense to dig deeper into those Mercyful Fate tendencies. And Return of the Witchfinder is that album. You’ll also find more of Meister Cagliostro’s weirdly satisfying transitions from falsettos to low growls, as he haunts the airwaves with his Satanic prayers and witchy spells. Hell, there are even moments when the drums provide some flair to the record. The biggest difference between Sanctimonious and Return of the Witchfinder is that the former hit me right away, while the latter is a grower. Appreciating this new record requires repeat listens to experience all the new intricacies the band has subtly incorporated into the mix.

After the haunting strings of “The Covenant” set the mood, “Darkest Rites” dives right in with soaring falsettos that climb one second and dip into menacing growls in the next. The riffs are traditional to the style and, honestly, none too impressive. But, as I said before, the back-and-forth dueling solos are bigger and badder than ever. “The Thief’s Candle” takes the vocal performance even further—flailing, flying, and growling in absurd ways. The mid-paced plod lends well to the flow of the vocals until it approaches hooking, midpoint leads that eventually fall away to nothing. It kicks back in with melodic, reverberating guitars and soft vocals before growing to a climactic finish. But, the follow-up title track tops the others for hooks and dueling guitar work. This chugger pounds away on your brain and impregnates it with one of the speediest and most memorable choruses on the album. Unlike the others, the guitars play off each other not in the ways of Mercyful Fate but, instead, Iron Maiden. This subtle axe work adds even more influence to the song and propels it in ways the band has never achieved.

That said, the best tracks on the album are the beefy “Azrael” and the bombastic “The Baleful Baron.” The first charges out the gate with badass, intricate, old-school Mercyful Fate riffage that takes me way back. When it hits the chorus, I almost forgot which album I was listening to. Completely out of his wheelhouse, Meister Cagliostro sacrifices the falsettos for powerful clean vocals that stunned me. But in a good way because I can’t find fault in the decision, and the song wouldn’t work any other way. As it transitions to traditional King Diamond territories, it builds once more to predictable solo work to close out. Set up beautifully by its instrumental predecessor, “The Baleful Baron” showcases lively kit work before diving headfirst into perhaps the most killer riff on the record. With a tight, five-minute runtime, this track is a powerful piece that builds as it goes, concluding with stellar overlapping King Diamond vocal action.

As a complete package, Return of the Witchfinder is a strong addition to the band’s catalog. Where Sanctimonious sucked me in right away, the new additions and required investment of Return of the Witchfinder made it fun on repeat listens because there is always something new I didn’t catch on the previous spin. The only downside of the record is that it takes a while to get going. While I don’t fault tracks like “Darkest Rites” and “Hailstorm and Tempest,” I’m not really invested until I hit “The Thief’s Candle.” But, once you get to that point, everything else is worth it as the album gets stronger as it goes. In the end, the band hasn’t quite achieved that record that would push them into counter-decimation territories, but Attic shouldn’t be as good as they are. Once again, I’m impressed, swollen like an eggplant, and spinning this album like a top until I get more.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Ván Records
Websites: attic-vanrecords.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/atticfuneral
Releases Worldwide: April 5th, 2024

#2024 #35 #Apr24 #Attic #GermanMetal #HeavyMetal #IronMaiden #KingDiamond #MercyfulFate #ReturnOfTheWitchfinder #Review #Reviews #VanRecords

Chapel of Disease – Echoes of Light Review

By Steel Druhm

Evolution is hard to avoid. Humans evolved over the eons, and each individual evolves as they grow older and experiences the outside world (except for Steel and Doc Grier). Bands inevitably evolve as well as members grow in ability and outside influences creep into their sound. It seems evolution eventually finds every band to some degree (except Sodom). That brings us to the fourth album by Germany’s Chapel of Disease. If a band like AC/DC seemed especially resistant to change over their career, these oddballs had an open-door policy, progressing from a fairly traditional death metal sound toward ever more proggy, spacey soundscapes with each successive release. Echoes of Light continues this trend, moving the band further away from their OSDM roots and out further into prog environs. As Echoes of Light unfurls, you will hear 70s prog, shoegaze, dream pop and all the things in between. You might even catch fleeting glimpses of metal too. Your appreciation for what Echoes of Light offers will entirely depend on what you go in looking to find.

The album opens with three songs pushing or exceeding the 8-minute mark, so you know Chapel of Disease have a lot of ideas they want to air out. The opening title track comes to life slowly, offering a mild rock sound that becomes more and more urgent with gothy guitar work eventually joined by the death-lite barks of Laurent Teubl. It’s not all that far from what Tribulation and Moonspell did before, but it’s mellower and more restrained. Much of the song length is occupied by subdued noodling and introspective pluckery, with little here to remind you these chaps were ever a death metal band. Even the blast beats that erupt toward the end feel neutered and domesticated. Much more engaging is album high point “A Death Though No Loss” where the band puts their foot on the gas and brings more aggression to the coffee house open mic night. The guitar work is urgent and sharp, and this one feels more “metal.” It reminds me of Morbus Chron and though the band can’t resist musical side quests into snoozy, dreamy segments, it’s still a pretty entertaining number. “Shallow Nights” changes gears radically, taking you straight into Lake of Tears mopey goth rock and stranding you there as the band dabbles in grey moods and rainy day ennui. It’s pretty but it gets quite dull by the end of its 8-minute run.

“Gold/Dust” offers an interesting blend of the band’s many influences, shifting between goth rock idioms, Alcestian dreamy, shoegazery, and more urgent metal-adjacent guitar play. It’s the one song here I wish was longer, where I spent the rest of the time wishing other songs were shorter. By the time the album winds out, you realize Chapel of Disease is as far away from their death metal roots as they’ve ever been. Echoes of Light is not only less OSDM, it’s way less metal of any kind. This is a proggy, dreamy goth rock album with metal seasoning, and that’s okay if that’s what you like. The album sounds great, with a warm, inviting production where everything is crystal clear and vibrant. The 42 minutes don’t feel overly long, but certain songs do.

Laurent and Cedric Teubl are talented guitarists capable of mining numerous genres for inspiration, and they throw a lot of diverse styles at the wall throughout the album to see what sticks. A lot of what they do this time has roots in goth rock, with a goodly amount of shoegaze and dream pop inspiration in their strumming as well. I hear a lot of Anathema, Alcest, Lake of Tears, and Deafheaven, but very little in the vein of death metal. Laurent’s vocals drift from rough barks to clean croons, and he does the material justice, but I find myself wishing for more aggression from him. Maybe I just want the things that the band already left in the past, which makes that a me problem.

I’ve enjoyed the evolutionary process that Chapel of Disease underwent from 2012 onward, but with Echoes of Light, it seems they’ve reached a new form that no longer resonates. It’s all well executed and showcases the band’s creativity, but the absence of aggression, edge, and intensity makes it a harder sell for those who crave a bit more FIIIII-YAH!! Interesting, but no longer within my wheelhouse because I’m an unevolved ape beast.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Van Records
Website: facebook.com/chapelofdisease
Releases Worldwide: February 9th, 2024

#25 #2024 #Alcest #Anathema #ChapelOfDisease #Deafheaven #DeathMetal #Feb24 #LakeOfTears #ProgressiveMetal #Review #Reviews #VanRecords

The Night Eternal – Fatale [Things You Might Have Missed 2023]

By Steel Druhm

Sometimes we get a promo and for whatever reason, it languishes in the sump unloved and unexplored, and later on we find out we missed a real gem and feel collective shame. Other times we just don’t get the promo at all. The latter was the issue with Fatale, the sophomore outing by German goth/heavy/occult metal act The Night Eternal. This was really a shame as it’s easily one of the best metal albums of the year and features an irresistible blend of Mercyful Fate, To Die For, Unto Others, and Ghost. Had we received it, I would have lavished a massive score upon it and spent the rest of the year singing its praises to any and all who would listen. This was not to be, but fortunately, I was able to discover it on my own and give it the attention the album deserves.

If pressed to give a fast and dirty description of what the listener is in for on Fatale, I’d point to the sadly defunct Swedish act In Solitude, as the sound and style here are very similar, and opener “In Tartarus” is a top-notch rocker that recalls them quite intensely. That “Mercyful Fate as Goth rock” sound is just so hooky and engaging, and Ricardo Baum’s vocals are perfect for the style, completely sucking you into the album’s dark mood as the music rocks your socks down to the graveyard. Baum sits at the crossroads of a youthful King Diamond, To Die For’s Jarno Perätalo, and Tomi Joutsen of Amorphis, which is a helluva good place to be. And can the man ever sell a song? “Prince of Darkness” is a first-rate metal anthem that grabs you fast and refuses to let go, and “We Praise Death” is one of the best songs of the year. This one will leave track marks on your grey matter.

There are no weak moments to be found on Fatale and the album as a whole has a great flow and a collection of high-level tracks that will make you hit replay immediately. Just as I manage to escape the thrall of one cut, the next one becomes my new obsession. Getting away from this thing is like trying to extricate yourself from some eldritch tentacle monster that got into a Gorilla Glue factory, and to say this has been on steady rotation in the House ov Steel would be a ridiculous understatement. Try to spin “Run With the Wolves” just once, I dare you. Or try to give short shrift to closer “Between the Worlds” and see how that works out for you.

It’s very easy to focus on Baum’s excellent vocals, but much credit must be given to the guitar work by Rob Richter and Henry Kaseberg. They ground their playing in Goth and trad metal and frequently dot the songs with sweet hooks and slick hooks. They bring a righteous old school charm and flair to every cut, parking the sound in the 80s while somehow making olden tricks sound like fresh dogs. It’s the songwriting that truly brings Fatale home, however. These cats know how to craft a killer tune and punch it directly into your memory centers where it promptly establishes permanent residence. This is a List Killer and it will get to you. You’ve been warned.

Tracks to Check Out: “In Tartarus,” “We Praise Death,” “Between the Worlds”

#2023 #Amorphis #Fatale #Ghost #GothicRock #HeavyMetal #IdleHands #InSolitude #MercyfulFate #TheNightEternal #ThingsYouMightHaveMissed2023 #ToDieFor #UntoOthers #VanRecords

Good morning! Today, I infused myself with some older sounds that I was very passionate about some years ago. Maybe the #OccultRock band that more #BlackMetal listeners revere to eternity because the spirit and poetry are there, and the music is so enthralling. When the message is right, inspiration to create great things follows closely.
Btw, Bandcamp asked me to open my wallet again but I already did for those #VanRecords beautiful #TheDevilsBlood deluxe editions 😅

https://thedevilsblood.bandcamp.com/album/the-thousandfold-epicentre