BLACK METAL DAILY’S LISTCRUSH 2021: The GOS Edition

Well folks, it’s been a helluva year in black metal. Just like last year. And the one before that… and the one prior, and so on. Seems like a damn near impossible task at this point to keep up with all of the amazing music produced on a weekly basis in our obsidian corner of the metal world, let alone try to sift through and pick out those gems which, for each of us, really stand out and shine with that blackened light. Yet, here we are. End of the year list time again. Aside from borrowing from a handful of reviews I’ve already done this year, I’m just gonna start writing about the shit that I liked. Let’s call it … a memoir. My black metal top 50 memoir of 2021, ready? Here we go.

~

ALBUM OF THE YEAR

~

CÂN BARDD (Switzerland). My word, do I love that Devoured By The Oak album, currently listening on a daily basis! Came out towards the end of the year (November), but by my third playthrough I knew that it was in serious danger of usurping WINDFAERER for the number one spot of the year, a band which had laid claim to that position since like July or so. And I think it has done that. Not only did Devoured By The Oak manage, to some extent, to shove aside all other 2021 considerations, it also fuckkkking annihilates the previous CÂN BARDD discography, by a considerable degree IMO, reaching the grandiose folky realms already occupied by kings like SAOR, BORKNAGAR and WINTERSUN… and this somewhat sounds like a combination of those bands. Every song is a goddamn epic, and everything is perfectly timed and placed, all the somewhat awkward, clunky aspects of previous albums (which I never really got into at all) completely streamlined, cleaned up, and dialed in, particularly the drums. On top of that, it was released at the perfect time for me, the turn of the season into winter, right when I am in the mood to listen to exactly this sort of thing. It’s. Goddamn. Beautiful. 

~

TIER ONE

[five creations of black art]

~

And WINDFAERER’s (US, New Jersey) Breaths of Elder Dawns? It is excellent as well, right up there and by far my most listened to album of the year. Kudos to them for damn near achieving, with only violin (and a few extras here and there), the epic levels for which many other bands require an entire orchestra. They went from being a pretty good black metal band with good violin to really taking it to the next level in terms of composition and complexity and weaving it all together. They still very clearly have a black metal foundation, but there’s a lot of artistic, avant-garde elements which really make it massive, make it a masterpiece, yet without getting too off track. I think that with this album they have really broken free and reached a new pinnacle, not only in comparison to their own previous work but in comparison to any relevant subgenres of extreme metal in general: melodic black metal, post black metal, progressive metal, et cetera, with comparisons also to SAOR but additionally acts like NE OBLIVISCARIS, HARAKIRI FOR THE SKY, and PANOPTICON. 

~

FUNERAL MIST (Sweden). Can’t fuck with FUNERAL MIST. Surprise release with Deiform at the end of the year, but no surprise at all that it takes a top spot for me. Filled with blazing, unhinged riffs, unparalleled vocal variety, infernal blasting on all aspects of the drum kit, and a healthy dose of the religiously macabre, Mortuus delivers exactly what we would expect of black metal orthodoxy. Perhaps not as hellish as Devilry, not as blasphemous as Salvation, not as twisted and grotesque as Maranatha, not quite as contemplative as Hekatomb. Closest to sound to the previous two, but Deiform is darker and with more fire. It overtakes them on the speed/aggression factor and ultimately probably stands above Salvation as well. You cannot fuck with FUNERAL MIST.

~

The atmospheric/symphonic subgenre, like the folk/pagan selections (overtaken by CAN BARDD), was the victim of a late coupe. While ANGUIS DEI had hung on since the beginning of the year, right at the end I became completely infatuated with the complex epic / symphonic / progressive / atmospheric project ETHEREAL SHROUD (England). Trisagion is made up of three massive tracks (four on the physical releases) which total out to almost 65 minutes (closer to 80 on the physical), each of which are comprised of three movements. It is beautiful and powerful, bright and melancholic, creative and devastating, contemplative and expansive all at once. Incredible release that I am just starting to scrape the surface of. 

~

ANGUIS DEI’s (Japan) Angeist is a goddamn masterpiece. Man there is a LOT going on.  A ton of variety within an orthodoxically satanic, symphonic, avant-garde scaffold, successfully managing to combine, intentionally or unintentionally, many of the attributes of the very best sounds that symphonic black metal has ever had to offer. It sounds “classic” within the SBM vein, but the staggering amount of variability within that scaffold and overall cohesion is what really makes it a force to be reckoned with. It’s like… when the fucking five Power Rangers come together to make that big fucking robot? This is that robot, the rangers are CRADLE OF FILTH, EMPEROR, VESANIA, ANOREXIA NERVOSA and ROTTING CHRIST and if you are a fan of those bands then this album is essential. Every instrument is masterfully utilized and the vocals are just maniacal. 

~

MAQUAHUITL (US, Tennessee) – Con Su Pistola en La Mano [ep] is hard-hitting, galloping, cutthroat southwestern bandido black metal. It’s practically impossible to not fall back on WAYFARER, but best as a contrast instead of a comparison: MAQUAHUITL is faster, dirtier, more focused, more aggressive, and more capital-B-and-M-Black-Metal, and would be better compared in sound to DARK WATCHER or VITAL SPIRIT or, even better, something more orthodox like SKAN or GLORIOR BELLI, yet allowing an even more cross-cultural elements to permeate the music, with Latin guitars, wind instrumentation, and cumbia percussion. The album revolves around the legend of Mexican outlaw and folk hero Gregorio Cortez attacking, killing, and evading American Texas Rangers on the Mexican-American border, June of 1901.

~

TIER TWO

[ten creations of black art]

~

FERRITERIUM (France) gave us a fucking excellent second album entitled Calvaire, which is very straightforward and clean, but not particularly innovative, original, raw, or any other extreme. Nonetheless, in some sort of way this album is… -perfect-. No frills classic melodic black metal with riffs that literally do not quit, there’s not a single thing about it that I do not like.

~

A new discovery for me was the post/progressive WOMAN IS THE EARTH (US, Minnesota), with new album Dust of Forever, which manages to be surprisingly rabid, dynamic, and exalted all at once, achieving a breathtaking level of beauty without using any synth at all, as far as I can tell. The ever-soaring, unrelentingly  dynamic nature of it somewhat reminds me of stuff like SUHNOPFER or AORLAC possibly, although WITE is a bit more… ‘post-black’? At any rate, the melody and somewhat lighter aspect of it helps me keep up with the twists and turns.

~

VORTEX OF END’s (France) Abhorrent Fervor is a slightly death-tinged, powerful, rabid yet artistic orthodox black metal album with an array of exciting elements, not least of which the goddamn vocals (handled by no less than three members) accounting for the insane variety of screams, roars, growls, yells, chants, whispers, and cleans. FFOs include other French acts like AOSOTH, ANTAEUS, TEMPLE OF BAAL, and (definitely) ARKHON INFAUSTUS, but also (and maybe even more so) the unabashed horns-in-the-air rocking-fucking-black metal of MISÞYRMING’s Algleymi, a more muscular evolution of ASCENSION (particularly the auditory occult mysticism of Consolamentum), and the infernal, grinding-riff ferocity of Gaahl/King era GORGOROTH. 

~

Gonna admit that although I am (still!) having a bit of trouble absorbing it fully, I’m pretty damn intrigued by FYRNASK’s (Germany) new opus VII – Kenoma, which for me falls right in with the likes of the heavily meditative SCHAMMASCH and vividly ritualistic MEPHORASH, although it is more dissonant, dense and abstract than both. 

~

VVILDERNESS (Hungary). Significantly more of a banger than previous releases, As Above, So Below nonetheless manages to maintain the sublime Hungarian folk sounds which are completely unique to this band and meld them with a heightened momentum and aggression for a really cohesive listen. Although it is hard to beat the serene natural harmony of Devour the Sun (2018), I do think that I am enjoying this new one even more than 2020’s Dark Waters.

~

You know who else got heavier? PANOPTICON (US, Minnesota). Fantastic right? Austin has always had that amazing Americana folk aspect and it’s in full effect with …And Again Into The Light, but as a whole the album is way heavier than I thought it would be, bringing in some doom and death elements, and so massive that I still feel like I’m just beginning to scrape the surface of that one. Fucking huge, and I love it. 

~

The INHERITS THE VOID (France) album Monolith of Light is stellar cosmic black metal. I absolutely love the cinematic, epic melodies on top of that speedy percussion, the chaotic swirling on the guitar layers, and the sheer immensity of everything that’s going on, all of the different simultaneous tracks and layers. There’s so many things about this that sound atmospheric, from the keyboards to multiple guitar tracks to the drums… I want to get to know this album well, to find all of those intricacies and nuances that I can tell are there but can’t possibly absorb without more playthroughs. FFO: MARE COGNITUM

~

ARISTARCHOS (Scotland) gave us an excellent self-titled debut which, harnessing blackened stormwinds, is more terrestrial but no less catastrophic. Although unrelated, ARISTARCHOS’ sound is directly in line with that perfected by Naas Alcemeth’s projects, specifically NIGHTBRINGER, with a similar layering of falsetto guitar lead, although somewhat less massive and overwhelming in general. Nonetheless, I fucking LOVE the sound and I knew that this album was placing somewhere on my year-end list on the first listen. 

~

Kudos to NULL (US, Virginia). I’m actually a little surprised I like Hiraeth so much, considering its immense diversity. It has a black pagan/folk scaffold but that structure is filled in with damn near everything: neofolk, thrash, epic melodeath, rock, spaghetti western, pop punk, humppa, American folk… the list just goes on and on, and every time I listen to it, it seems like I find something else. The double-CD album allows for a ton of FFOs (including FALKENBACH, FINNTROLL, SAOR, WINTERSUN, ELUVEITIE, UNREQVITED, CATAMENIA… shit, even old OFFSPRING!) with 18 tracks and a runtime of about 110 minutes, it’s honestly good fortune that the entire thing is as great as it is. 

~

Since I already have so many FFOs flying around here, I might as well get into another fairly obvious parsing together of amazing elements from black metal history and talk about the STORMKEEP (US, Colorado) album Tales of Othertime. Between 90’s era EMPEROR, DIMMU BORGIR, BURZUM, SATYRICON, and WINDIR, there isn’t really much that hasn’t already been done here, but goddamn they put it together SO fucking well and have such masterful songwriting, that this debut LP was born an instant classic. 

~

TIER THREE

[twelve creations of black art]

~

Near the top of the ‘orthodox’ list is a close-to-my-heart Order ov the Black Arts-born debut which features elements of both cosmic and industrial black metal, but still manages to emit a distinctly demonic air: PALUS SOMNI’s (US/England) Monarch of Dark Matter. Comprised of members of ANCIENT HOSTILITY / ALUDRA, DECOHERENCE, and AKHLYS, it is a debut which is industrialized but raw, vast but dense, measured but chaotic, and progressively driving with increased conviction towards inevitable galactic annihilation. I had the honor of facilitating a bit of networking for the creation of this project, and also the honor of contributing the sigil logo.

~

Also hellish but in an entirely different way, MORGAL (Finland) came out of nowhere, amirite?! Nightmare Lord is blazing, beer-drinking black metal combined with a nostalgic NWOBHM classicism… it’s like if you took the ‘Hallowed Be Thy Name’ (Iron Maiden) cover by CRADLE OF FILTH, cranked up the ferocity factor a bit, gave it a bunch of cocaine, and then made an entire album out of it. There’s also a sort of more belligerent thrash or almost punky aspect to it, and some parts remind me of TSJUDER or RAVENCULT.

~

THERMOHALINE’s (Brazil/Portugal, Belgium, Argentina) mind-blowing avant-garde, ocean-themed album Maelström was the first album that I reviewed this year and it set the bar high. It has a massive, multilayered array of complexity and depth as well as almost baffling progression, disparate approaches, and seamless melding of many different styles and details, including industrial elements. This is avant-garde extreme metal at its best, and it could certainly claim black metal as a central core, but what is being presented with Maelström (apt title) goes way beyond that. 

~

Moving from outer realms towards inner depths, we have the particularly hellish and subterranean Paradeigma: Phosphenes of Aphotic Eternity from the ever-evolving INFERNO (Czechia). Notable with this latest and highly anticipated album is the truly cavernous and oppressive direction, not least of which is exemplified by the buried vocals and hallucinatory, esoteric crush of doom-laden black delirium. 

~

Then, on to AULD RIDGE (France) and his latest offering of venomous Consanguineous Tales of Bloodshed and Treachery, featuring fantastic fiery riffing, galloping percussion, spiteful vocals, excellent use of menacing, epic synth, folky acoustics, and even some twang once in a while. Think the riff / vocal savagery of GORGOROTH’s Under the Sign of Hell, combined with the bombastic synth grandiosity of LIMBONIC ART’s The Ultimate Death Worship… with some pagan influences thrown in. Somewhat arbitrary to include this album (released in May) or December’s Consanguineous Tales of Faith and Famine.

~

MALIGNAMENT’s (Finland) debut album Hypocrisis Absolution, was released in September, but is officially the last album I found which made the list, not discovered until the first week of January, 2022 and sneaking into placement on the last edit. I wish I had found it sooner! It forgoes the typical Finnish top-of-the-mix vocal abrasion for some more subdued and slightly deathened style which includes what comes close to chanting yells at times. Somewhat like PANZERFAUST. Musically it has a similar groove at times but with fiery riffing appropriate for the country, and Viking elements thrown in. Thanks to Hells Headbangers for advertising this one for purchase… don’t mind if I do!

~

FRIISK’s (Germany) new album …un torügg bleev blot Sand seems to skate that line between being orthodox but also melodic and atmospheric. What it really reminds me of is the defunct ANTLERS (also from Germany), to the point that I thought it was a continuation of that project, expertly incorporating grandiose melancholy, somewhat subdued vocals, highlighted epic lead guitar, pensive plodding intermixed with driving aggression, and even the use of somewhat martial percussion (ie. compare ‘Mauern aus Nebel’ with ANTLERS’ ‘Hundreds’). Even the logos are similar. At any rate, fantastic stuff. 

~

One-man monster KRVNA (Australia), gave us a blasting, stylized, subtly symphonic and precise black metal assault which boasts amazing drums and lead guitar. Dubbed ‘vampyric’ by its creator, Sempinfernus seems to be such in concept alone, and really seems to have sonic roots in 3rd/4th wave clean aggression, sitting somewhere in between turn-of-the-millennium DIMMU BORGIR, DARK FUNERAL, and BEHEMOTH, but the best of all three.

~

Another marine-based album which came to the surface only in the last few weeks of 2021 was LHAÄD’s (Belgium) release. Inspired by the depths of the sea, Below ended up being much heavier than I initially assumed it would be, almost death-metalish in some parts, crushing in its fluidity. This surprise (along with the more deathy PANOPTICON), really helped to fill a void for me this year, since there ended up being relatively very little death metal which really caught my ear.

~

CRYPTOSPITAL (Belarus)! Damn… Scythe of the Black Death caught me off guard. Fast-paced, unpolished, aggressive, melodic atmospheric black metal with cool as fuck vocals. Takes a minute to get going, but once that first track hits around 2 minutes and 15 seconds, it hits pretty damn hard.  Then holy FUCK! Listen to that part at 6:25 and then even more so at like 6:50, THEN AT 7:10 !!!! This is classic melodic black metal PERFECTION, no joke! And that’s just the first track!

~

Man, the new OSSAERT (Netherlands) also kicks ass. Though not described as such, it almost makes sense to think of Pelgrimsoord as a sequel to the debut album Bedenhuis (2020), a surprisingly coherent mix of raw / melodic / progressive / punkened black metal, and exceptional songwriting. Track two, ‘De Val en de Beroering’ is particularly fantastic and contains one of the best progressions of the year, with a ludicrously badass driving progression, intoxicating lead riff, and a repeatedly thrashing, convulsing bassline that I can’t even really begin to describe. 

~

AVDAGADA (Sweden) – Damnatio Cursus [ep] is well-produced, aggressive riff-based deathened black metal with nuanced synth and fantastic vocals. FFO GLORIA MORTI, KRYPTAN (see below). Not to get off topic, but GLORIA MORTI happens to be probably my all-time favorite band from Finland, so a comparison is definitely saying something.

~

TIER FOUR

[twenty creations of black art]

~

THE WOLF GARDEN (England) was a close-to-the-last minute addition that had initially escaped me in the oversaturation of the final months of 2021. It was my brother-in-arms Naph (co-conspirator in our conversational FERVUS CONJUNCTUM reviews at Black Metal Daily) who pointed out the verifiable virtues of Woven of Serpent’s Spines. Almost equal parts nature-inspired emotive atmosphere and driving, elevating post-black melody, I couldn’t help but notice a similarity between it and the also excellent WINDFAERER release (sans violin). An excellent album.

~

For FELLED (US, Oregon) the expected Pacific Northwest, Cascadian folk tag is right on target with fantastic melodic passages, soaring guitars, tumbling drums, and an organic mix. The Intimate Earth also wields  imperfection well and embraces a certain looseness, a natural imprecision and unpolished quality which produces an unparalleled sense of grounded earnestness and honesty. 

~

KRYPTAN (Sweden) – Kryptan [ep] Is classic ‘third wave’ melodic Swedish badassery with a dash of synth and a good dose of excellent vocals. Another band (read: NORDJEVEL, HORDE OV HEL, AVSLUT) which is doing DARK FUNERAL way better than they are doing it themselves. Also FFO: NAGLFAR, TRIUMPHATOR.

~

The release which is more black metal than black metal, from a band which takes orthodoxy quite literally and manages to be often exponentially more demonic sounding than 99% of the scene at any given point of time… despite being devout Roman Catholic: REVERORUM IB MALACHT (Sweden). Though two albums were released at the end of summer simultaneously, it is the more aggressive and grinding Not Here which really caught my attention with its continual percussive battery, massively down tuned bass, terrifying and sublime vocals, and insidious industrial grind. I’ve said it before and it is still relevant: With this project, for me the end result is not *enjoyment* but *awe* instead. 

~

SUMERIAN TOMBS (Germany) – As Sumer Thrones At Night [ep]. Far from the romantic or historical vampiric sound of current BM trends, what we have here is a connection to a bloodthirsty source which is more ancient, primitive, pervasive, and infernal… and this is reflected in a more orthodox and demonic sound. 

~

RÜBEZHAL’s (US, Alaska) Remnants of Grief & Glory consists of exalted, triumphant black metal melodies gust over layers of deathened, burly vocals, and a harnessing percussion and overall songwriting. Expect fiery riffing, brief but effective guitar hooks and well-placed cascades of irresistible, driving blasting, and tempered sections which build and overflow into more commanding, groovy progressions. Each song provides its own take on this fantastic resonance of exaltation and brutality, utilizing a classic, melodic black metal approach with a weighty application of death metal and even doom elements.

~

CARATHIS (Austria) – Hymns to the Tower [ep] is blasting, raw(ish), thrashy, and has riffs that smolder in your brain after just a single listen… just straight up unadorned classic black metal! FFO TSJUDER, RAVENCULT, ASAGRAUM

~

SALQIU (Brazil) – Urban Post Black [ep] is a short, avant-garde and somewhat industrial black art offering, fantastically resonant and disorienting EP, the sound of which may be translated into the experience of a perfect, brief soundtrack to urban angst.

~

GRAVENCHALICE (US, Florida) dropped another one! I don’t like Samael quite as much as their previous, it’s a bit more methodical and doomy, but still awesome. A concise description would be elements of the dissonant occult gravity and dynamic atonality of DEATHSPELL OMEGA, perfectly conjoined with the sublimely melodic, intractable momentum of MGLA, but better the most recent offerings from both. Finally, a few that are a bit more ‘old school’.

~

NOLTEM (US, Connecticut) I perceive as having a heavily water-based sound overall, and Illusions In The Wake is like a lucid, surreal dreamstate, with meandering acoustic recurrence over nonchalant percussion which seems to unfurl in jazzy eddies, delirious distorted strings, and harsh vocals, often with a faint rush of turmoil, building inertia, and apexes which overflow into an expansive, beautiful cascade. It also boasts one of the most unabashedly colorful album covers in recent memory.

~

An act that I did not realize was so melodic until I finally caught up with it was this year’s Dy’th Requiem For The Serpent Telepath was ESOCTRILIHUM (France). Mislead by perhaps a faulty perspective on previous releases, I expect oppressive, harsh, dense heaviness, not the pervasive melodic aspect which is present here. I’m talking real melody, classic black metal melody. Not just thrown in amidst a bunch of oppressive dissonant blasting, but instead a melody with emphasis and space created for it which brings to mind shit like old DIMMU BORGIR (think ‘Mourning Palace’), CALADAN BROOD, LIMBONIC ART, and FALKENBACH. 

~

DARK WATCHER (US, Arkansas) – Hymns Of A Godless Land [ep] is high energy, horns-in-the-air, spaghetti-western-flavored americana black metal, short and sweet. FFO recent MAQUAHUITL, VOLAHN, and VITAL SPIRIT.

~

MORKE’s (US, Minnesota) We Are The River is a must-mention; a very personal, genuine, melancholic, introspective, powerful, beautiful 80-minute release, poignant both from a conceptual and auditory perspective. Truly an ambitious project, which clearly demonstrates that the project needs a good label contract.  

~

AGRYPNIE (Germany) graced us with Metamorphosis, boasting a fairly heavy symphonic element, and affixing it into an overall style which is altogether more modern and progressive, resulting in some massive, crystalline, and powerful material. Think HARAKIRI FOR THE SKY but more epic arrangements and less irritating vocals, and also FFO BELTEZ, GAEREA, and VUKARI. 

~

With this year’s Arkivet, WORMWOOD (Sweden) went in the direction that I hoped they would. Each song is more in line with what I particularly appreciate from previous works (specifically the PINK FLOYD-esque guitar lead), and each one has nuances that continue to reveal themselves after a few listens. I venture to say that even though Nattarvet’s finish sets the bar for peak WORMWOOD, overall Arkivet is the better album. 

~

This would normally be the place I would place the ever-productive UNREQVITED, probably my favorite black ‘post / gaze’ project and a frequent entry on my AOTY lists. However, although it is good (and I still bought it) the ultralite Beautiful Ghosts album didn’t resonate with me as much as the quite similar but darker and more sinister HÆNESY (Hungary). Featuring lush atmospheric delirium, buried and indistinguishable vocals, and excellent black metal drive at times (‘Drowning In The Final Intellect’), Garabontzia certainly put this project on the map for me. 

~

GRANDEUR (Austria) – Aurea Aetas is unfancy, violent, but melodic black metal with some fiery lead on top and blasting galore, hitting that prototypical black metal sweet spot and hitting it hard with the backing force of some driving crust/punk inertia! 

~

VUKARI (US, Illinois) – Omnes Nihil [ep] is progressive black metal done perfectly: great focus, great balance, great drive, great production, this time a bit heavier than their last album. This band just gets better and better with every new release. FFO BELTEZ, GAEREA

~

KAMPFESWUT (Germany) – Kampfeswut [ep] is stripped down, squealing, punky black metal with an AGALLOCH-ish folky acoustic element. 

~

DUSK IN SILENCE (Indonesia) also hit a sweet spot with me for reasons which are a little hard to put a finger on other than the fact that Beneath the Great Sky of Solitude’s memorable riffs and outstanding progressions just immediately wormed their way to my mind loop to the point that I grabbed that LP one Bandcamp Friday. 

~

HONORABLE MENTION

[not black art]

~

To round out 2021 with a solid top 50, I’ve got FALLENSUN (Canada) – The Wake of the Fall. Epic progressive melodic death metal at it’s finest. I have a MAJOR weakness for this sort of stuff and my all-time favorite album (ever) would fall into this description (DISILLUSION – The Liberation). FALLENSON do it near perfectly, a gorgeous melding of deeply moving euphonies and deathened extremity, this debut album elevating them to the heights of fellow aeronauts AN ABSTRACT ILLUSION, NE OBLIVISCARIS, ETERNAL STORM, COUNTLESS SKIES, IOTUNN, IAPETUS, and DESSIDERIUM (who’s 2021 album Aria has at least some potential beat out The Wake of the Fall once I give it a fair shake). 

~

Follow Black Metal Daily on Facebook, Instagram, Spotify and Bandcamp HERE for more cult sounds and tonal blasphemy.

FURVUS CONJUNCTUM, Tome III: ‘Breaths of Elder Dawns’ by WINDFAERER

~

Participants: Ivan aka GOS, Shaun aka NAPHULA, Nathan Hassall, Mikey of Moshpitnation-mi

Collaborative Review, 7.25.2021 | 6:50 PM – 10:00 PM

Transcription: Rachael

~

INTRODUCTION

The Dixie fire was burning in the Plumas National Forest and was adding a thick layer of apocalyptic haze to the atmosphere at cabin in Northern California. In the noxious shadow of smoldering destruction 25 miles to the west, persistently threatening to envelope and end our extended weekend of black metal, indulgence, and comradery, the five of us turned our gaze upon a single burning tree on the album cover of WINDFAERER’s new opus Breaths of Elder Dawns. The image of this fifth album from US melodic black metal adepts, soon to be released by Italy’s excellent Avantgarde Music label, depicts a singular incinerating tree, dark smoke rising from it and forming the profile of a hooded figure, an ancient spirit of fire, presiding, menacing, ineffable, and inevitable. As we looked upon that cover, and then beyond the window pane where smoke was pluming on the horizon, the world made us feel like we were pawns in the novelist’s literary device known as the “pathetic fallacy” or “personification”, where nature matches the mood and has the illusion of a human intention, and our proceedings seemed blessed (or cursed) with a hypernatural significance. In Ivan’s words: “fucking metaphorical”. The proceedings, a collective review on WINDFAERER’s upcoming masterwork, was an idea initially put forth by Ivan, the process cooperatively refined by all. Though arduous, it worked extremely well in the end despite the threat of both external and internal disaster, and we came away with something that, to our knowledge, has never been done before in extreme metal journalism. 

What happens when you put five people in a cabin, four of whom are black metal obsessed, three of whom are Order ov the Black Arts admins? Considering that both the album and our party was comprised of many styles and mostly necessary tangents, Ivan, Michael (Mikey), Nathan, and Shaun bantered, bickered and ranted during the tracks, replayed many bits, took notes, and waxed philosophical as a mixture of alcohol, marijuana, tarot, and a psilocybin afterglow “enhanced” the listening experience. What happens, in other words, is journalistic and editorial chaos. What vibrates through the air with effortless fluidity is not always easily captured by written words and sentences. Luckily, and absolutely crucially, we had a beautiful and gracious scribe. Rachael (who manages to tolerate Nathan, first referred to black metal as “demon music”, and once stated “Maybe if they sang more, more people would like the music”, but proudly now claims interest in numerous black metal and adjacent bands) recorded our feverish musings at a downright superhuman pace, wine on hand, fingers like lightning. With her vital support, we are now able to present exactly what happens, what happened, when the five of us beheld Breaths of Elder Dawns for the first time…

~

PRELUDE

Ivan: Alright, are we ready to do this? I appreciate everybody being here, I think this is going to be pretty fucking cool. But, I have possibly talked about this album far too much. What are you expecting?

Nathan: Overhyping is always a danger. We’ll see.

Shaun: I have no expectations because I didn’t like the last album. [Alma, 2018]

Michael: I think it’s going to sound like SAOR.

REVIEW

{ ‘Oxalá’ }

Ivan: Okay so it’s an odd way to start. Sounds like Christmas, hope. Then gets a little dark and sounds like… disillusionment. 

Shaun: Like part of a musical or something. It’s definitely a cool build up.

Nathan: Kind of muffled tribal beat. Alright this is a sick fucking beat. This is good. I was expecting something more atmospheric.

Michael: It’s kind of like they dropped the folk for this moment. Just to give the heavy aspect. 

Shaun: Are their vocals like this on the Alma album? I thought they were rougher than this. I don’t know it very well. Maybe I’m just drunk, but I feel like I should revisit that album when we’re done with this.

Ivan: Alma is really good. You are, and you should!

Nathan: Hmmm. The vocals give me a sense of fantasy, wonder. The violin almost cuts through the center of the music. It feels like the other instruments are revolving around it. If it were a sandwich, the violin will be the wire cut of cheese. And that’s what you come up with when you’re stoned.

*laughter*

Nathan: That was a cool drop back into the music. Feels like you’re kind of like… *gestures and dances* There’s also something for your ear to cling onto, as there’s so much going on it’s important to ground the listener in some way.

Ivan: When it gets going with the drums, it’s got a lot of good pacing, it’s… easy, casual. It’s not just like a wall of sound, there’s plenty of room to breathe. Michael, there’s some SAOR elements for you.

Michael: Sounds like Forgotten Past. There have also been moments where I got an IRON MAIDEN vibe. 

Ivan: I’ll have to take your word for it.

Nathan: I like when bands use something other than guitars, bass, drums or vocals—in this case, the violin—and use it as a prominent feature of the album, rather than used simplistically and just for atmospheric purposes. Did the violins just interchange? 

Ivan: I remember that in my little Alma review in the Order, I described the violin as riffing at the same time as, or similar to, the guitar.

Michael: What label is this on?

Ivan: Avantgarde. 

Nathan: I feel like the violin is flying off into different directions. It has a mind of its own, like it’s forking through the sky like a strike of lightning. 

Shaun: I like the fact that it seems to be mixing multiple genres fairly quickly. So it’ll go from like thrash, to epic, to folky, to flat out black. I like the fact that it’s constantly transitioning.

Nathan: I completely agree—and the transitions are seamless. They’re done so well they almost feel effortless. 

Shaun: It’s definitely something you could explore in depth, since there’s a lot going on. Even though the production is clean and it’s easy to hear everything, there is still enough change and different shit going on that keeps it interesting. 

Ivan: I appreciate the really heavy groovy, head banging aspect of the last part of the first track. 

*‘Oxalá’ ends*

Ivan: It seemed like everyone was surprised when the track first started and I’m just wondering what you were expecting.

Michael: I like this a lot more than I thought I would. At this point, the direction of the music is a lot better than I thought it was going to be. I wasn’t sure that this would align with my taste or if it was going to be something that I like. 

Nathan: I was expecting the music to be more post-atmospheric, repetitive, and overly reliant on an overt “I’m in a beautiful forest” vibe. The sensibility of that specific beat that sounded like you’re walking and feeling pretty fucking cool. 

Shaun: The thing that surprised me was that intro. Immediately that Christmasy sounding shit threw me off, as I wasn’t expecting that kind of intro. Afterward, I was expecting a bit more of that mid-paced metal sound with just violins, but as it evolved it was constantly transitioning between different genres. I don’t remember the previous album being that complex.

Ivan: When I first heard this one I was like, “Oh, this is huge, this is an album where a lot of attention was paid to every aspect”. They even mention that, in the Bandcamp write up about the album, they paid attention to each detail. 

Michael: Yeah. Because I thought that within the first minute. Shaun said that when he heard the Christmasy intro he was surprised by it. Now, I was actually expecting that and thought there would be a lot more of that style.

Ivan: That’s what you were expecting, man?  That I would play you lullabies and shit?

Michael: I want it gritty.

Ivan: It’s official, to nobody’s surprise, Mikey is more kvlt than I am.

Rachael: Don’t hate me if this transcription isn’t perfect.

Shaun: I’ve hated you since the moment I met you.

*everyone laughs*

*EMERGENCY ALERT SOUNDS* [fire evacuations mandatory for locations relatively nearby]

Michael: The vocals sounded more human than like a demon or something. It’s more of a personal expression. This whole thing has been pretty good.

Nathan: It’s more of a shout than a shriek.

Ivan: Goddammit, it is awesome! And it’s only the first song!

Nathan: Well NOW our expectations are high!

*laughter, Ivan drinks more*

{ ‘Depletion’ }

Shaun: I like the sweeping violin that led into the track.

Michael: This has a FUATH sound. This has that kind of aspect to it.

Nathan: I like when there’s a continuous, reverberating nature to the guitar riffs that allow the listener to ride them. There’s no chop or chugging to the guitar at this moment here. The riffs stretch in and around and out of each other.

Ivan: Yeah, the transitions are fluid.

Shaun: And the progressions are smooth. 

Michael: And this is that part where they drop the other stuff and it’s just metal. To give the listener what they’re there for. It’s like the shadow…

Nathan: Cool! The vocals just dropped into a harsher black metal style for a bit. A sprinkling of that demonic feel that Michael said he wasn’t expecting to be present. We’ll see if they bring that element back again.

Ivan: I love shit that’s just *gestures aggressive drumming*… and then they tend to progress into the epic and avant-garde.

Shaun: I’m kind of surprised how much of this album is driven by percussion. Also, the fact that it’s a black metal band with a live violinist, yet the drums are so prevalent in the structure. One would think that the violin should be the driving force rather than the percussion being more prominent, but the percussion is this driving force. One of my favorite things is when music intermingles with the percussion. They have parts where the drum will be *makes rolling noise* and the other instruments go with the fill. I love when shit does that. Have you listened to AEON? The percussion is driving the music. The drums are guiding what the guitars are doing. They do a good job at blending it.

Nathan: Building on what Shaun was saying, I like that the drums have a particular type of thump that grounds them. They mitigate the violin from soaring too high, keeping it somewhat more buried than I’d expect. To me, the drums are reflective of the earth element, juxtaposing the violins which evoke the element of air through their soaring. When the violin is allowed to poke out, I feel a sense that we are on the threshold, in some sort of limbo between ground and air. Lovely.

Ivan: Goddamn poets.

*laughter*

Ivan: (to Shaun) So you are saying that in contrast to how many symphonic black metal bands make the mistake of trying to let the symphonics drive the song too much, this is more grounded in the percussion, and although the violin is there, it’s on par with the guitar, not in the lead?   

Shaun: I don’t think it’s a mistake, but aside from that, yes. They do a better job of blending it. 

Ivan: My interpretation is that they’ve crafted this album with enough intent that in the beginning of the songs they lay the foundation with the percussion, but by the end of nearly every track, they have, as Nathan says, moved from the earth to the air, and every track was almost, like technically or structurally epic, where there’s this long progression of really—*pause*—intentional layering and then a release towards the end. This is not just a black metal album with violin in it, every track is carefully crafted in this way, and WINDFAERER have really hit a new landmark. I really liked the last album, but this is a new level.

Michael: The whole shadow thing… well, y’all made something out of it, earth and air, I feel like this album shows more of the shadow, the darker, heavier side of what I was expecting from the music. Of the music. Although polished, it’s not a light-feathered affair. It’s focusing more on the dark shadow beyond the surface of what’s actually being presented. This is where the dark shadow, or the darkness of the earth, has its voice.

Ivan: That’s true. But once you’re up in the air there’s no shadows. *Ivan signals his mind being blown but extends both hands from his temples and stretches them out into the room.*

*laughter*

Michael: It’s more focused on the dark shadow of something that’s beautiful. Basically, it’s more metal than what I was expecting.

Nathan: In haiku, when your mind is blown by the juxtaposition in the image, it’s called an “a-ha!” moment.  There’s a moment in every single haiku where you realize the implied image and juxtaposition become clear. It’s extremely satisfying.

Shaun: What the fuck is this bitch babbling about?

*laughter*

Nathan: An excellent contribution, Shaun. Fuck you!

Shaun: Nathan just finished a beautiful, succinct fucking point, but don’t worry about that *looks at Rachael* just get what I said.

*everyone laughs, Nathan looks dejected*

Shaun: I was following what you were saying, I was just giving you shit.

Nathan: The shit is well deserved!

Ivan: We are a fifth of the way through the second track….this is going to take fucking forever. Fuck. This is going to be a 12 page document. And Dex is going to be like “what do you expect me to publish?!”

Nathan: Well, other people might read a bit of the beginning… We’ll distill it to its highlights.

Ivan: It’s going to be unique, that’s for sure. Alright now, just listen!

*Everyone goes quiet. Michael & Nathan’s eyes are closed.*

Ivan: That’s awesome. Now this vocal part sounds a little bit like HARAKIRI FOR THE SKY or something.

Nathan: There’s a kind of soaring desperation in the vocals. But sometimes the guitar is lighter, so it carries the listener out of that emotion a bit. *puts head in hands and laughs manically to himself* And I can’t repeat any of that because I’m high and I don’t fucking remember what I just said.

*laughter*

Ivan: Man I LOVE shit that has a fast pace but also melodic.

Nathan: Yeah you tend to only like the rawer side of black metal if it is melodic, right? Similar to when synths are used to juxtapose fast-paced drumming? I also enjoy when synths are used to slow down the music, even when other elements are fast, which fosters disassociation within me.

Ivan: Yep. I do well with contrasts. Like speed and melodicism. But when it’s got a lot of dissonance or heavy oppressive aspects, I have more trouble. *listening to music* This is awesome. *Waves hands out, then in, then out*

Nathan: You look like you are conducting an orchestra.

Ivan: Ha! If I were to dance to this, I would be conducting. It’s a good way to express how I feel with the music without dancing, because I feel self-conscious dancing. 

Nathan: I feel self-conscious too, but I do it anyway. Not sure if that’s the right thing to do. 

Shaun: That’s cool. [*Guitar Solo*]

Nathan: The guitar solo feels like light.

Shaun: Ethereal?

Nathan: Yes, but without clouds. The pure spirit that is sunlight.  

Shaun: You see what I’m saying about the percussion though? The percussion blends so well with what the riffs are doing. That’s where it makes me feel like it’s driving it, because it mishmashes so well with the rhythm of the guitar. 

Ivan: Yeah. I know exactly what you mean.

Nathan: There was something there that sounded like a background spiraling/arpeggio guitar but so buried that if I wasn’t listening to it on decent speakers, I’d miss it. Like a spiraling down. 

Shaun: I call this riff “the toilet flush” 

*everyone laughs*

Nathan: Well, I bet you’ve never heard it before… [in-joke about creating a black metal band with all original riffs ensues]

Ivan: … This is a unique riff.

Nathan:…This band is named after a demon that you’ve never heard before. 

Michael: *Puts on a serious face.* This is about to blow…

Ivan: *enthusiastically interrupts* CLEAN VOCALS! I love clean vocals when they’re damn good.

Nathan: They’re really dream-like and not cheesy. Clean vocals in black metal are often too cheesy, and that puts me off 99% of the time. 

Ivan: They especially must be good considering we are coming off of that mushroomed Schammasch binge yesterday. 

Shaun: Ooh, it’s chanty!

Michael: That’s where I’m definitely more into the chanting thing.

Nathan: These vocals are more priestly, celestial.

Ivan: Ecclesiastical? 

Nathan: Yeah, exactly! That’s the right word.

{ ‘A Forbidden Path’ }

Shaun: So given the track length I’m assuming this song is going to mostly be an interesting interlude with some violin mixed in. There’s some kind of high pitched ukulele or something.

Nathan: What’s that stringed, vibratory Indian instrument called? It sounds a bit like that. 

Ivan: A sitar?

Nathan: That’s the one. 

Michael: That little guitar flutter just screams “post”. Keeping in line with the elements, this is more air than earth.

Ivan: It’s a good contrast. They’re taking their time to really slow it down. This is nice, just a short acoustic instrumental. 

{ ‘Into the Mist’ }

Shaun: This is definitely a post black metal intro thus far. Like right off the bat. Reminds me a lot of the band VVILDERNESS.

Nathan: The violin is really effective in slowing down the pace here, and now it’s giving a high-pitched droning sound which is incredibly satisfying. And good choice on the vocals, I love the howling vocals. They feel very authentic. 

Ivan: Again like HARAKIRI FOR THE SKY after the slower intro of this track. Track two [“Depletion”] got right into it, but this one had a buildup. Very nice. Like in HARAKIRI, this type of vocal would grate on me if they used it for the full album, but they don’t do that. Their vocal variety keeps things interesting.

Shaun: The violin in this song reminds me of NE OBLIVISCARIS. I like the fact that the violin is done well and it is not overbearing or prominent, because if it was too much violin the music would become too soft. It stays aggressive while still being very melodic. 

Michael: Also, dynamic. 

Nathan: Agreed… *Doing his best to wait patiently for Rachael to catch up typing and feeling like he’s going to burst, before speaking too fast* Because it’s organic within good production, I like that the violin is not overbearing, because the album is already quite clean, and a synthesized violin would have made it too shiny rather than gritty.

Ivan: Although, it doesn’t have any distortion on it.

Nathan: Yeah I really like that. I often crave the natural instrument over a synthesized sound. It’s more authentic, human. And I like in this song that the violin is the storyteller. It takes the narrative of the album in new directions, and tells the tale more than the other instruments. In short, it’s fucking good.

Shaun: When I say prominent, I’m not referring to where it is in the mix, I’m talking about how much the song structure is relying on it. So, with say, ANOREXIA NERVOSA, the majority of their song structure relies on the keyboards doing most of the work while the guitars are doing fairly simplistic riffs behind it. 

Nathan: Do you mean the riffs are supplementary?

Shaun: Yeah. But with this, everything seems really balanced, the violin is not as prominent for the basis of the structure, the guitars are still doing a lot of the work, the drums are still doing a lot of the work, it’s a very well balanced musical structure. 

Nathan: What you said was really interesting.

Shaun: Thanks, you limey twat.

Nathan: *Spilling water on himself* Looks like your rude words made me incredibly wet, Shaun. 

Shaun: I have that effect on people.

*laughter*

Ivan: Jesus Christ. This is tangential. We’ve been at this for over an hour. We’re in the middle of the fourth song. The fourth song out of nine. NINE! And I’m not speaking German. 

*a blurring of these assholes yelling “NEIN!” and laughing*

Ivan: Focus people, FOCUS.

Nathan: I love this one bit where the violin is choppier, and it’s being played directly alongside the drumbeat, unlike the earlier part where it felt more stretched. It’s giving the drum further emphasis in a different way. Love it.  

Shaun: It almost didn’t even sound like a violin.

Nathan: That was fucking sick. They didn’t do drum fills like on that particular movement until the very end where they transitioned to the next auditory scene. He also hit way more drums than I was expecting on that fill. What a phenomenal way to pull us through the threshold between sections. That really stuck out. Riffing off Ivan’s words earlier, there was a strong contrast between parts there. That beat is fucking great.

Shaun: The violin almost does this weird transition, right here. Fucking cool.

Ivan: Compared to a lot of other parts, this is pretty savage, like… it’s got balls. *laughs*

Nathan: The cymbal work helps set a different type of pace. All the fills are fucking amazing, it wasn’t just that one.

Shaun: Yeah they are sick. This is what I was talking about with the percussion really driving the music. There’s a lot of shit going on obviously but the drums really play a major role in the tempo of the song. They’re not just there to keep time, there’s a lot of intricacies going on. 

Ivan: Into this clean section.  They did this with the last song too, an excellent reacceleration. 

Nathan: That was a cool series of intense movements and I kind of feel relieved that they’ve let the tempo drop for a bit. The slower, dreamier interlude to this track helps to complement the other parts of this high energy performance. It’s giving me a chance to lower my heartrate again!

Shaun: Is that a horn?  

Michael: I think there’s two layers of it.  There’s a solo right there.

Shaun: Wow, that’s a badass violin solo. This sounds a LOT like NE OBLIVISCARIS!

Nathan: It’s the best moment so far of the violin, especially as the note it hits is so high, it’s almost a falsetto. This organic sound feels so human. Phenomenal stuff. We need to replay that.

Ivan: I wholeheartedly agree.

Rachael: We’re already at nine pages of typing.

Ivan: FUCK!

Shaun: This was your idea, bitch. You made your bed, now lie in it.

Nathan: Let’s just call this review “Four Dumb Cunts Speaking Pure Shit”.

Shaun: That is fucking hilarious.

Ivan: Maybe we should write our thoughts down while listening and then talk more at the end of the tracks so we can get through this album. We’re already at almost two hours. 

*Everyone grabs notebooks/phones to record thoughts*

Ivan: It’s going to be an adventure to edit. I think we’ve been getting sidelined.

Nathan: I don’t think we’ve gotten sidelined yet. We’ve only had good and necessary tangents.

*laughter*

Shaun: I thought we were going to replay something?

Ivan: Yes, that massive violin solo.

*replaying end of ‘Into the Mist’*

Ivan: The violin is amazing. These vocals are spot on. The drums are awesome.

Shaun: I was just going to say that!

*Ivan nods head and drums to the beat*

*Michael and Nathan’s eyes close*

Shaun: Almost sounds like a horn?

Nathan: Yep, it definitely has a wind-like instrument quality to it

*guitar solo*

Ivan: Fuck yeah.

Nathan: The bass guitar also functions like a drumbeat here, adding power to the rhythm of the drums. That was the best track of the album so far.

Shaun: That was badass. 

Michael: Well I think this song, one thing that made it my personal favorite as well… it’s funny how the whole howling thing was coming in and out from the very start of it. When the howl happened, it created a whole imagery of nighttime with the full moon and just the deep blue brightness because of how full the moon is. It was like day into night. At first it kind of had more of the red of the fire on the album cover, but then the howl brought in a dark blue, but pure and clear, there was no type of light pollution. 

Nathan: It was clear? I need clarity. You’re speaking in riddling metaphors. [note: look who’s fucking talking, Nathan!]

Michael: *Laughs* I guess so.  

Ivan: It’s official, track four is possibly the best song of the album and the end of track four, the best moment of the album so far. 

*everyone nods*

*snack / drink refill break*

Nathan: [To Shaun, sarcastically] I just ate three small carrots, now I’m stuffed.

Shaun: I didn’t fucking ask. 

Ivan: You guys ready? It has occurred to me that we’re in the shadow of a fucking massive forest fire and there’s a burning tree on the album cover. And the smoke is coming up into a hooded figure. Fucking metaphorical.

Nathan: The logo in itself reminds me of the sharpness of the violin strings, the white of the logo cuts through the blue album cover image, evoking a metaphorical association between the logo and music itself.

Michael: Kind of like the wind, like in a sense of freedom. I thought it would be softer based on the album cover, but now it makes sense. It’s more strongly structured than I was expecting it to be.

Nathan: I thought this album would be all naturey-softness. I thought it would be calmer. 

Ivan: What the fuck do you guys think I listen to?! 

Nathan: *smiles* Yeah, I know that’s off the mark for you. 

Ivan: So when I first listened to the previous album Alma, it was the first time I heard WINDFAERER. It was immediately after listening to A FOREST OF STARS’ Grave Mounds and Grave Mistakes, which of course also uses a lot of violin, but that album is really abstract and fucking bizarre, it is all over the place. Then Alma in comparison was so focused and cohesive. I was immediately like “THIS IS FUCKING AWESOME”. I’ve loved WINDFAERER since that moment.

{ ‘Astral Tears’ }

Ivan: This is your air element again, Nathan. 

Nathan: This is just like SAOR. And yes, we are back up in the air. This drumming feels bloody excellent. 

Shaun: It’s very thrashy. Like 80’s thrashy. What is this album’s name again?

Ivan: Breaths of Elder Dawns.

*Wave crashes in the middle of the track*

Nathan: Ooh, a new element! They replaced a drum fill with a crashing wave. What a way to transition. So now we have the water element more prominently in use. We’ve discussed the somewhat more abstract use of the ground and air elements, and now the wave is the clearest indication that the water element will come to the forefront. It beautifully carried me as a listener into its swell, and crashed me onto the shore of the album’s next movement. 

Ivan: What the fuck are you talking about?

Shaun: Fucking poets, waxing intellectual. I like that there’s so much variation. It keeps the whole album interesting.

Ivan: Was that an IHSAHN shriek? 

*‘Astral Tears’ ends*

Nathan: I found myself in this track, especially at the beginning, feeling somewhat impatient for the music to get darker or heavier.  They’ve brought in the drowned-water-element metaphor shouting vocals again but I’m unsure whether they need to be there. It kind of just feels like an old idea reused, rather than an interesting new context for the stylistic choice. However, after that section it picked up and climaxed really satisfyingly and managed to hit the peaks the last song did. In short, the strength of the track was in its climax rather than in its build up for me. 

Michael: Relative to the color scheme that I was talking about for the last song, the fifth tack went back to the red, the more focused center of the arc. Track four will be that stand-out track, track five stands in contrast to the stand-out track. I was in the album art itself, and track four was when I was in this dark, bright, blue light of the stars, but track five brought me back to the red. No light pollution, like illuminating.

Ivan: This track was ok, but overall I think it’s the least exciting on the album. Even then, it was mostly the first half which was unremarkable and then I thought that it got really good right after those waves in the middle and it ended really well. Another thing I’ve noticed so far is that multiple times throughout the album we’ve had a hard time discerning if something is violin, synth, vocals, or guitars, a sitar, or some other shit. Sometimes you really can’t tell. And it’s happened enough times where I wonder if it’s intentional blurring or obscuration.

Nathan: That’s a really good point.

Ivan: It’s a mystery. They’re making a sound but it’s up to the listener to figure out what is going on because it’s not always apparent. It takes some digging and listening to figure out what’s happening… it feels strategic or intentional, to create engagement.

Nathan: To get meta for a moment, I think on your point *gestures at Ivan* that the music does something which good art in general does for me, it asks the listener questions to probe and go deeper into, rather than providing answers. Good art takes a question and leads to more questions. 

Shaun: Succinct edit of what Nathan is saying. Good art leaves it up to the viewer for interpretation and lets you wonder what you’ve tried to decipher what is being portrayed. Right?

Nathan: Kind of, and it is definitely asking questions. But if you kept listening to it and trying to discern the instrument without doing a bit of internet research, you may not necessarily ever get the answer to what it is.

Ivan: There are questions being asked in the art that the listener is forced to answer. They’re posing a query to the listener and it’s up to the listener to respond. It’s a bit of a dialogue.

Nathan: Yeah, but in your own exploratory way. When you look at a painting, for example, you might see a lot of movement in it. I think of the image of an alchemist staring at an alembic and the reader has to use their imagination to work out exactly what it is they are mixing or trying to achieve. 

Shaun: It leaves the interpretation of the art up to the perceiver. The person who’s engaging in that art is left up to that responsibility of what is being portrayed. It depends on what type of art you’re looking at, it could be a painting, a sculpture, a song, so good art is basically an interpretation by the user and not put out by the creator. So everyone can interpret individually.

Nathan: That, but the creator also had an intention. The creator sends out the signal, but the person viewing or listening aren’t receivers. Sure, they take them in, but they process the information and it occupies a unique spot in their heads. The information synthesizes with what the listener already knows, and they put their own spin onto what it is they are experiencing. 

Rachael: You mean like classic projection? *smiles sarcastically*

Nathan: *Shakes head, smiling.*

{ ‘Starcrossed’ }

Shaun: Are those bagpipes? Huh. That was random, for a second I thought that was violin again, I was like wait a minute!

Nathan: Yes! 

*song accelerates*

Ivan: WAHOOOOO! This is beautiful!

Nathan: [in what he thinks is a good Scottish accent) Sounds Scottish! The bass in this one is now more complementary to the guitar, whereas previously it was adding oompfh to the drums. So basically, the bass has a different purpose and it’s contributing in a way that it wasn’t before. 

Rachael: [I want pasta. This was not said out loud but it is true nonetheless. Extra cheese please.] *Awaits Nathan to carry out his earlier promises of egg-noodles* 

*song slows*

Shaun: Oh, that’s cool.

Ivan: There’s definitely a pattern here. Every song in the album has a decompression, a slower interlude in the middle of each track.

Michael: Yeah. Before it was so smooth, putting in different instrumentals, now it feels like it’s moving a bit away from the smooth. It’s interesting.

Nathan: This is almost medieval in a sense. I imagine a lute might come in, ha. Damn that bass is so good.  I like their mid-tempo stuff a lot here.

Ivan: It does sound kind of medieval. Also, sometimes the drums cascade, and it sounds like PANOPTICON or OVNEV. The drums never really rest, they are always working, churning, always moving. 

Nathan: There are vocal elements similar to PANOPTICON too. The guitars are a lot more prominent in this track. It’s been given a lot more space to shine than in previous tracks. They’ve even taken the violin out of this part so the guitar has its own time in the spotlight. It’s not quite the same sound as the violin, but it is doing a similar job of shifting the pitch higher and higher.

Ivan: This part reminds me a lot of the last album. This seems like a tune that can get stuck in your head pretty easily. That violin part right there.

Shaun: It’s definitely very catchy.

Michael: *nods in agreement*

Nathan: That bit was good. Way more driven by guitars in this whole track. They’re shining more now, and that bit was really fucking cool. Lead guitar was phenomenal throughout. Now another quieting down? 

Ivan: Two minutes till the end of the song. Is this… a second decompression?

Shaun: Yeah. I personally enjoy interludes like this a lot. Two in one song is not a problem.

Nathan: It feels overwrought to me. An intro and two interludes are too much. 

Ivan: Last minute of the song, let’s see what happens here. Will it be awesome? Some sort of solo or something?

Shaun: I hope it goes into some sort of badass outro. 

Nathan: The vocals are increasing in intensity nicely. 

Ivan: Yeah, like “oh it’s a vocal solo”? Not really a solo, but I love the guitar.

Nathan: Going for a fade-out, are we?

*‘Starcrossed’ ends*

Shaun: After only having heard violin the whole time, the fact that they started with bagpipes almost made my brain malfunction. I was wondering what the fuck kind of violin is that? I did enjoy the fact that they added in bagpipes.  And once the song started it was some great riffing. Some great lead guitar going on in this song.

Nathan: They do enjoy the effective use of new instruments or samples to both bridge between sections of songs and between songs themselves. Like with what Shaun was saying with the bagpipe starting, they used it for the first time to signify a new movement, and reminds me of how they used the wave to some extent.  

Michael: Hmmmm. That was my least favorite track. I don’t think it flowed as well as previous tracks. It started with bagpipes, but if I don’t hear the bagpipes later, I feel like they have decided to use it as a toy, just once for the sake of it, rather than as a repeated and fully fleshed out element. It’s like once you’ve made that ground choice, it needs a bump. Unless it comes back, I don’t think it helps thread the song together the way it would if they made it present more. 

Nathan: Another element they just used that they could have re-used was a specific guitar riff. Ivan and I both looked at each other willing for it to come back, but it faded into the background as an idea rather than a fully realized utilization of something promising. 

Ivan: I think it was something that happened right before that second decompression. And there were at least like four opportunities where it could come back, but it didn’t. I was like, “goddammit”.

Michael: There wasn’t a constant flow in this track. We had the mid pace, then we had this ambient, then we had this fast paced section going, and then we think the song’s done, but it’s not, then there’s a soft part. The flow just isn’t quite there. It feels more patch-worked stitching than a coherent tapestry. 

Nathan: The term Ivan keeps using for the slow parts is decompression, so I’m going to go with that. I’m not sure why they needed two of them. The song wasn’t demanding enough to warrant it in my eyes. But I know Shaun disagreed, as he fucking loves an interlude. 

Ivan: On the other hand, it also had strong guitars.

Michael: I think they were all awesome parts, but doesn’t mean it has the right connectivity or flow.

Shaun: I’ll grant that if the song is already not flowing well and then you have an interlude, the lack of flow gets exacerbated. 

Ivan: This song makes me doubt myself and think that I have to listen to the song one more time. I thought it was great, but I think they all are. Reflecting on what you’ve said, maybe I need to listen to it more.

Nathan: If you listen to any song once or more, your future listening is affected by anticipation from memory which alters the listening experience incalculably. We’re all listening to this for the first time, whereas *points at Ivan* you’ve listened to it before. So you’ve got a more fleshed out interpretation of it, whereas ours comments are raw. Both make for an interesting analysis.

Michael: And I have never done a review like this where it gets paused and rewound, like we keep doing, so this is a whole different way to kind of take in an album, like a movie being played and watching it scene by scene.

Nathan: I like that, like dissecting it. 

Shaun: *looks at Rachael* Are you okay? That was a lot of shit to note down. 

Nathan: I can’t wait to send this to Dex on a fucking scroll. We can turn up at his house and unravel the scroll and tell him he can do whatever he wants with it. This is essentially a thesis. I want a PhD in WINDFAERER. 

Shaun: We’ll stand at Dex’s house shouting “I HEREBY DECREE” — and just roll out this giant fucking scroll…

*laughter*

*dinner break*

 { “Orchard” }

Nathan: The violin has more tension here, more horror-like elements. It almost sounds like a scream.  

Michael: It sounds like the very beginning of ‘Lustmord and Wargasm’ [CRADLE OF FILTH]

Ivan: Yeah I can hear that, also vaguely somewhat like “Venus In Fear” [also CRADLE OF FILTH, same album, Cruelty and the Beast]. That was quick. Fine, but necessary? Not sure. Anyway…

{ “Longing to Ascend” }

Ivan: This is nice. Again, I’m not sure if that is a guitar or violin, but it does sound like it’s trying to fly, struggling against something.

Nathan: Something is tethering the music. It’s not allowing the ascension it’s teasing. Like a helium balloon that has a string tied to a rock. It’s in the air, but for now it can’t quite get to the heights the elements inside it are seemingly “desperate” to accomplish. I don’t know why, the violin feels like it’s shimmering. It’s teasing us with light but not letting us fly into it. 

Michael: So the music hasn’t been able to break through to its whole mission of ascension. It still has that hold.

Shaun: It’s still tethered.

Ivan: Good now I can tell this is a violin *laughs*. That was cool.

Nathan: This is like Sunbather by DEAFHEAVEN —but with less meandering and more focus. Sorry, nekro-kvltists. Also reminds me of a band called LIGHT BEARER, a doomy post metal band. It also has better vocals, and this album has a complementary tone of darkness to go with the lighter parts. *rubs beard philosophically* The tension of the balloon string keeps getting tighter. Like more helium has been added, stretching it out. But it also feels like the rock is heavier, and the string is threatening to snap.  This track is very similar to post-rock in that it constantly dares to crescendo. It might not, though. We’ll see. It’s tense.

Ivan: Let’s hope that happens. 

Michael: That part had a very creepy vibe, almost vampyric. Because it had that Transylvanian sound. 

Ivan: Yeah, all of the sudden it sounds kind of foreboding.

Nathan: It was thrown in quickly, but I found the briefness effective in that element. Also, sometimes the guitar sounds like a saxophone. 

Ivan: *laughs* just throwing that out there, are we? First bagpipes, now saxophone?

Nathan: Good choice to drop it back into this intensity. It was like DEAFHEAVEN, but dropped into a darkness that DEAFHEAVEN don’t like to go into. And therein lies this song’s strength, and DEAFHEAVEN’s weakness. 

Ivan: I’ll have to take your word for it.

Nathan: Now the darker elements and the previous lighter bits are coalescing. There’s a yin-yang element to it, and they’re orbiting each other. This is ridiculously effective. 

Ivan: Okay, it ascended with the cleans! That was well done.

*Nathan and Ivan laugh*

Nathan: *Holds his face in his hands.* Gah, I didn’t like the clean vocals there. I really wanted them to be stronger, I wanted them to project out of the cloud of the music and into the sun. 

Ivan: I really liked the cleans but also I’m not in disagreement. They could have cut loose more, really gone full on without restraint. There was a higher level that they just didn’t reach, but the track is called ‘Longing to Ascend’, not ‘Ascending’, so maybe it was intentional.

Shaun: How much is left of this song?

Ivan: Two minutes.

Nathan: This is a very good stylistic choice after the clean vocals though. Feels like something diabolical is happening.

Rachael: I like this part.

*‘Longing to Ascend’ ends*

Nathan: The ending felt like a “Ta-Da!”, it was really weird. Like even in the studio they were bowing to their audience after rapturous applause. Ha! But that was cool. 

Michael: It was exploring, using weird strings. There was this one specific five second bit that drew me into it, and I was trying to focus on it and then this came out of left field. It sounds good but it wasn’t that specific flavor that they had for those 5 seconds. I think that song brought me into it more than the last. I was not a fan of the last song and this one brought me into it more.

Nathan: It’s more cohesive again I think.

Ivan: Did you guys catch that weird cutting out which happened at the end? Was that intentional? Is the MP3 fucked up?

Shaun: It sounded like it skipped. 

Ivan: So far the album seemed really organically focused, it was odd to introduce an overly digital technique, like losing reception or the sound cutting getting choppy and cutting out at the end. Anyway, it happened in the last 50 seconds of the track. Maybe that’s the ascension? Losing reception?

Nathan: It sounded like we went through a gateway, like a barrier for a second there, we broke through (the balloon) and were left to surf in the static of the universe… like… breaking through…

Ivan: And, I’m almost positive there was a sound of a wave crashing at the same time.

Nathan: If that’s a wave there again, that’s really interesting.

*replaying end of track*

Ivan: Do you hear the ocean?

Shaun: I hear thunder.

Ivan: Yeah, I hear it, you are right, not a wave, thunder.

Nathan: I can think of it as a wave of static along with the rolling clouds. The introduction of another naturalistic element, this time thunder, is extremely interesting, and has again been used to bridge tracks. Now we’ve gone from experiencing the power of the ocean to dealing with the immensity of an electromagnetic thunderbolt.  And once again they’re using Mother Nature’s occurrences to bridge songs. A fantastic way to announce what’s next.  

Michael: Now if the album ends like that, I think that would have been perfect! *Does an Italian chef’s kiss*

Shaun: Initially this song was very bright and ethereal. I’m kind of surprised they chose not to bring in any violin with that intro. Once the tempo picked up midway thru, this song really got better. But it still retained a very bright atmosphere. Then they changed into a more foreboding section where darkness was seeping through.When the clean vocals hit, I think the song really hit its climax. Good stuff. I really enjoyed the violin section during the outro. Almost felt as though I was being tugged down, but tugged down to stay with the song during its ascension. Interesting juxtaposition. 

Nathan: Mixing light and dark along with the elements together was really powerful for me. The whole listening experience came with a pleasing symbolic resonance. I feel good.

{ “Entombed In Glacial Waves” }

Shaun: Glaciers don’t have waves, they’re frozen—duh!

*laughter*

Nathan: You can bang your heads to that bit. It’s more ritualistic. 

*collective “ooohhhh” [in reference to the guitar]*

Michael: That’s black metal right there. That little pedal effect. The essence of the genre. 

Nathan: Ah shit, that’s fucking awesome.  I’m so glad they stayed dark and heavy through the first transition, the album needed more heaviness after the last track. Vocals are way more traditional black metal too, I wasn’t expecting this here. That violin is beautiful man. This is again a very post metal type of riffing. The vocals were too drowned out too, surprisingly. It’s cool.

Ivan: It’s definitely more aggressive, seems like kind of a departure from the last track.

Shaun: That’s exactly what I’m thinking. That was a weird transition.

Michael: There’s an echo behind it, the voice like he’s screaming out to something and having it ricochet back. This goes back to the second track where — (*Looks at Nathan for the right word*)

Nathan: It was swashbuckling? 

Michael: Yeah, exactly!

Nathan: I’m glad you said that. I do feel like we’re now on a boat. It was almost like he did it purposefully out of time. They’re utilizing silence more than they were in other tracks. There’s a space between the sounds which was constant before. Perhaps that was what the glitchiness was referencing? This track is allowing for the ascension that the previous one teased. 

Ivan: Yeah it started out pretty heavy, all those clean vocals and the super melodic part, feeling like a closure.

Michael: It’s like the storm is clearing up.

Nathan: *Eyes widen with the truth of Michael’s statement.* Yeah. We’re moving towards a type of conclusion, for sure. 

Shaun: It just got so bright. This song has been very aggressive, darker. It just moved into brightness.

Nathan: It’s offering up the light to relieve us from the shadow. That was really good.

*‘Entombed In Glacial Waves’ ends*

Ivan: *chuckles to himself, nods head in approval*

Nathan: They closed that out like a live show with that drumming! 

Ivan: That was a very classic ending, the song prior you mentioned a lot of DEAFHEAVEN post black elements, but that last song was straight down the middle of the road rocking black metal. But the end was like an epic flourish. Da-da-da-dut, da-da-da-duunn! You’d almost expect the closer to be more avant-garde, but was more back to straightforward black metal. 

Shaun: The final track definitely brought back some aggression and darkness.  I really loved the high treble, raspy lead guitar.  I found the interlude with mainly bass and violin odd.  The song went from being so dark and during that section, I felt like I should be hanging out in the shire or some shit. Nonetheless, I really enjoyed the fact that they returned with so much more aggression for this track, and there were some really great clean vocals in this song, mid-ranged, not too high pitched.  I prefer cleans to be similar to chanting or at least in the mid to low note registers, so these were very enjoyable.

CONCLUSION

Ivan: Well, what do you guys think, did I overhype?

Shaun: No, that was excellent.

Michael: Well the bagpipe didn’t come back in. Why was that there? Just because, like ‘I haven’t played with this yet’?. So it was good but track six was a monkey-wrench in the whole thing. Just mashing awesome elements together doesn’t make a cohesive track. So that track just wasn’t for me. The first track and second track had that flow that was great to showcase everything. So with track six, I didn’t feel that showcase, like here are all these awesome things. It was like a puzzle, and they were just trying to push that piece in but it didn’t fit.

Nathan: That’s a fair point. I didn’t love every bit of it, but there were so many outstanding songs and elements across the album. There were some bits that may not have been fully fleshed out and could have been explored stronger, and some of the clean vocals that could’ve been more convincing. However, my critical thinking on this album is quite significantly outshined and out shadowed by better elements. Because so much was engaging and top tier, I can give a pass to the less impressive elements. I hope the next album is even more intentional, perhaps stripping a couple of bits away to leave the music distilled to its core. A slight trimming of the fat. However, using a violin all the way through and letting it be so strong was well-composed and engaging for the most part. 

Ivan: Some bands that have violin, it almost feels forced, sort of arbitrary or contrived. But here it wasn’t like they were ever trying to add elements that didn’t necessarily need to be there.

Nathan: And they didn’t overly rely on it so that they could be lazy with the other instruments. 

Shaun: There were some elements like the bagpipes and the wave that never came in again. But I thought it was interesting to throw something different into the mix.

Michael: Now the wave is more fitting and flowing than the whole bagpipe thing. The wave was pretty great with the thunder rolling in. I heard that and then I was having hopes to have that part shine again.

Shaun: The bagpipe was definitely out of left field. I had an issue with the previous album because I became aware of it when I also was getting into WAYFARER. It is rather stupid in hindsight, but the similarity between the names threw me for a loop when trying to check out WINDFAERER‘s previous album because I was so obsessed with WAYFARER that I wanted the WINDFAERER album to have a Western influence. The fact that it didn’t have that influence caused me to lose interest on the few occasions I tried to check it out. Obviously after listening to Breaths of Elder Dawns, I need to revisit their previous album with different expectations because this album is absolutely incredible. The band did an amazing job balancing all the different elements of their music into a cohesive mix of awesomeness. I will definitely be purchasing this album. (*Nathan nods in agreement*)

Nathan: There were times in it where they wore their influences on their sleeves, like sometimes you could quite clearly hear sounds from other bands, like SAOR and DEAFHEAVEN. But then they mixed it with more novel elements of their own. I think the influences were pockets that were able to stitch together, and they brought in more darkness than the previously mentioned bands tend to. There were elements in the album that were implying that swashbuckling or almost a ship or water, and made that image concrete by just using the physical sound but other implying that there were aquatic elements in it. In other words, an implied aquatic theme was brought into the concreteness of light by the wave they used. I know I tend to hyperfocus on little details. I’m the same with poetry, I’ll obsess over a line break. I’m probably discussing the wave too much. Ha! But when I think of the thunderstorm with the static element, I felt a mysterious sense of disintegration. I think more of that would be great, because disintegration would have offered an excellent contrast to the cleanness of the album. More disintegration and disassociation please, WINDFAERER! I keep using these terms “elements” like air, water, earth, ya know? Ironically I haven’t mentioned fire, seeming as there’s one just beyond that hill [*points out the window through the smoky trees*] and it was on their album cover. I think I need to listen to it again, but… I want to feel more burning. 

Ivan: I loved it but I certainly wouldn’t complain if they cranked up the aggression factor or ferocity even further. There’s certainly plenty of melody and progressiveness to contrast and compliment it.

Michael: We got so stuck on those seconds of music [the end of ‘Longing to Ascend’] and had to keep hearing it and that is the art in music in a way. I really wish that’s how it would have ended. It really would have caused a stir in the whole thing. 

Ivan: My overall impression is this, which is why I was hyping this so heavily: they went from being a pretty good black metal band with good violin to really taking it to the next level in terms of composition and complexity and weaving together all the elements. They still very clearly have a black metal foundation but there’s a LOT of progressive elements happening—a lot of artistic, avant-garde elements which really make it massive, make it a masterpiece, yet without getting too off track. I think that with this album they have really broken free and reached a new pinnacle, not only in comparison to their own previous work but in comparison to any relevant subgenres of extreme metal generally: melodic black metal, post black metal, progressive metal, etcetera. This is the sort of creation which could be album-of-the-year material for me. It might take the crown for 2021, but that remains to be seen.

Nathan: Rachael, do you have any thoughts on this? 

Rachael: My back hurts. *laugh*

Shaun: Watch, she’s just been pretending to type for the last three and a half hours, but finally she just turns her laptop around, and all it says is “Fuck all of you cunts!”

*laughter*

Breaths of Elder Dawns releases August 27th via Avantgarde Music.

~

Pre-order Breaths of Elder Dawns on digital, CD and LP from the Avantgarde Music Bandcamp HERE.

Support WINDFAERER:

• Official Facebook
• Official Website
• Official Bandcamp
• Official Instagram

~

Like Black Metal Daily on Facebook for more cult sounds and tonal blasphemy.

Email: blackmetaldaily@outlook.com

Compilation of the Gods – A Review of Fólkvangr Records’ ‘Lords Of The North: A Tribute To Bathory’

~

Lets be honest: almost every serious metal fan with a modicum of taste likes Bathory (and if you don’t, well, your taste sucks). Over two decades mastermind Quorthon summoned some of the finest and most memorable albums metal has ever seen, and whether you find yourself partial to the project’s early first wave black carnage or the Viking epics of the later period tend to float your langskip a little more, the influence and endurance of the material is unquestionable.

It’s so influential and enduring that decades on many bands are still inspired to release covers of these classics, while over the years several labels have put out compilation albums in tribute (Godreah Records Voices From Valhalla and Hammerheart‘s In Conspiracy With Satan spring to mind). It’s something that likely will not and should not ever stop, and the latest label to pay homage to the greats is one of the best underground black/pagan/neofolk/dark ambient/dungeon synth curators currently active in the US, and longtime BMD favourites to boot: Fólkvangr Records.

We’ve all heard great covers albums, and we’ve heard some absolute stinkers – so is this collection by artists on the Fólkvangr roster worthy to be sung about in the sagas? I’m sure you know the answer to that already, but let’s take a look at a quick track by track breakdown of Fólkvangr Records Lords of the North: A Tribute to Bathory anyway… just incase you need a little convincing.

~

~

1) Unreqvited – Song to Hall Up High

Kicking off, Canadian post-black solo artist Unreqvited does what he does best by taking Hammerheart‘s ode ‘Song To Hall On High’ and transforming it into an epic, transcendent instrumental synth piece that portrays the grandeur of the original’s subject matter to a tee. The faint echo of Quorthon‘s vocals to begin the track is a lovely touch, too.

~

2) Eskapism – Enter the Eternal Fire

Now we’re really getting stuck into it as Ukranian duo Eskapism tackle Under The Sign Of The Black Mark‘s glorious head-banger ‘Enter The Eternal Fire‘. The duo remain largely faithful to the original but add a few extra layers of tastefully done choral synth that helps the track to soar higher than ever before. The improved modern production leaves it all feeling slightly less visceral but far more powerful, which is in no way a bad thing – you just try to not bang your head to this. Pro tip: it’s impossible.

~

3) Beorn’s Hall – Foreverdark Woods

The NHBM duo were always going to be well suited to this compilation and they provide an earthy, emotional and honest take on the Nordland I classic. Vulcan pulls off a solid imitation of Quorthon, and overall I expected no less from these gents. My only qualm… no mouth harp in the intro? I’m kidding, even that little detail is there. This is killer.

~

4) Dwarrowdelf – Nordland

When I saw the track listing I knew Tom O’Dell would absolutely nail this, and his cover of the mighty Nordland does not disappoint in the slightest. Capturing the spirit of the original with a little of that trademark Dwarrowdelf magic, this is honestly one of my favourite things I’ve ever heard him do – and consequently one of my favourite tracks on this compilation. Could we look forward to even more of a Bathory influence on the next Dwarrowdelf album, perhaps?

~

5) Forefather – Man of Iron

Pagan UK do Forefather were simply built to cover this. Possessed of a deep and resonating integrity, their treatment of the already stunning piece Man of Iron is nothing short of beautiful and will likely bring a tear to your eye. Quorthon would be looking down from Valhalla and smiling.

~

6) 1476 – Blood Fire Death

I was intrigued to see what the US duo would bring to the table here, and I have but two eloquent words to describe their rendition of the timeless Blood Fire Death: Holy. Shit. Does the vocal attack match the passion of the source? Does it ever – at around 8:10 I sat up and swore in amazement. With a brighter and cleaner production to elevate it, this is yet another triumph.

~

7) Windfaerer – Blooded Shore

US crew Windfaerer take the epic Blooded Shore and give it some teeth, by way of their possibly-triple vocal attack’s vicious throatwork. Your opinion on this will likely depend on how attached you are to the original’s soaring clean tones – I think it’s a fucking great take on an already marvelous tune.

~

8) Lóstregos – Un Bo Día Pra Morrer (A Fine Day to Die)

Now, A Fine Day to Die is one of my favourite Bathory tracks, and Lóstregos are one of my favourite pagan black metal bands – so is this a match made by the Gods? You’re damn right is, as the Spanish horde make a great track even more intense by ramping up the BPM a little (at least it feels like it, anyway) and singing all the lyrics entirely in their native tongue. Two words: this rips.

~

9) Ulvesang – The Lake

The Canadian duo of Alex and Ana give this already bewitching track an unexpected (for those unfamiliar with their previous art, anyway) neofolk reworking – imagine the introduction of the original carried onwards and became the entire composition and you’re in the ballpark. Gone are the distorted guitars and drums, the entire thing is interpreted on two acoustic guitars with deep, somber vocal intonations that give the song an entirely new vibe. Very well done, and completely captivating.

~

10) Funerary Descent – Call From the Grave

And to take us out, probably the cover I was most intrigued to hear on this entire compilation – the immense Call From the Grave, by way of the blackened funeral doom of US demons Funerary Descent. Slow, low and utterly fucking crushing; this fearlessly drags Bathory to miasmic depths of turgid blackness never before seen… and is the perfect way to end this remarkable journey.

~

…so, there you have it. To answer the earlier question posed: this is one of the finest tribute compilations I’ve ever had the pleasure of experiencing. Over the course of a year this impressive array of likeminded artists and co-conspirators toiled to compile a touching memorial to the legendary Quorthon; they all poured their souls into it and you can feel the love and reverence in every detail, from their interpretations of the music itself to the superb Marc Whisnant cover art. Thanks to the great mastering job by a certain Alex Poole it’s also a remarkably coherent listen that still allows the nucanced idiosyncrasies and strengths of every artist to shine through, too… all up, it’s a wonderful tribute that’s more than worthy, and every single person involved with this should be proud.

Between the CD and tape version there are 500 copies in circulation; grab yourself one today. I’ve got mine. Hail Fólkvangr, hail Quorthon… hail Bathory.

~

Purchase Lords Of The North: A Tribute To Bathory digitally on Bandcamp here, or on CD and cassette from the Fólkvangr Records webstore here.

Support Fólkvangr Records:

• Official Facebook
• Official Website
• Official Bandcamp

~

Like Black Metal Daily on Facebook for more kvlt sounds and tonal blasphemy.

Email: blackmetaldaily@outlook.com