Hail Conjurer: Abyss & Ekstasis
Out 23rd September on Into Endless Chaos Records / Crypt of the Wizard
Over several albums, Finland’s Hail Conjurer have been offering curiously deconstructive takes on black metal, pivoting on doom metal pacing, depressive moods, and dominant yet oddly fragile synth tones offering an eerily mournful counterpoint to the distorted backdrop. In this context, ‘Abyss & Ekstasis’ could be read as a change in direction. One that dispenses with these experimental elements in favour of what can only be described as the best album that post 2006 Darkthrone never made. It may be heavy handed to describe this latest offering as a total volt-face for this artist. The second half does decay back into experimental black doom and noise. But throughout, Hail Conjurer appear much more focused on fleshing out riffs and melodies in a pivot to relatively accessible black metal whilst retaining an underlying menace of entropic experimentation.
Following the rather Skepticism adjacent intro ‘Unheimlich’, ‘Ecstasy of Flesh’ oscillates between a riff very reminiscent of Bathory’s ‘Call From the Grave’ and a more melodic black metal lick, setting the tone for the first half of the album. Essentially an expertly curated showcase of the genre at the intersection between the first and second wave, one that feels referential to recent Darkthrone but flowing far more naturally and joyfully. The music is simple yet refreshing thanks to the transparent authenticity of the performance and delivery. Oddly cathartic melodies offset dirty punk riffs, the wholesome charm of meat ‘n’ two veg metal riffs are juxtaposed with Hail Conjurer’s still explicit love of rule bending and boundary testing. But the fact that this latter element takes a back seat for the first half of the album gives this artist a chance to demonstrate that they are quite capable of expressing themselves in a more straightforward style, despite the fact that this is often supressed in favour of a more explorative approach.
The production reflects this, building on a rather basic, raw mix, but one wide enough to accommodate additional timbres over and above guitars and drums. This allows the music to shift quite naturally from classic metal gallops to blackened doom and noise, the stylistic evolution across this album occurring completely organically. Loose, playful drums subtly frame this scene, allowing the bombastic guitars and emotive vocals to dominate the centre stage. Choices that payoff as the album transitions into funereal doom on the penultimate track ‘Golden Pages of Contempt’.
Hail Conjurer remain an overlooked object within the contemporary black metal landscape. I’d speculate that this is due to their oddly tentative attitude toward engaging with the genre, frequently dissolving into noise and funeral doom at the behest of distinctive melody. It remains puzzling then that the modern listener claims to crave the experimental and original more than ever whilst ignoring some of the most likely candidates working in this field. That being said, the more accessible pitch found on ‘Abyss & Ekstasis’ is the strongest work I’ve encountered from this artist to date. Not only does it prove their worth as a solid riff machine, it also manages to fashion a captivating identity in a crowded style, and even further, it fully integrates these more typical elements into a work that is still fearlessly meandering, enquiring, and thorough in its desire to follow ideas through to their logical conclusion, even if said conclusion ends in miasmic noise.
Funeral: Funeral
Out 25th September on Caligari Records / Black Legion Records
One of the more convincing attempts to marry trad goth sensibilities with black metal, largely because it eschews the carnivalist tendencies that usually accompany this impulse in favour of chorus driven guitar lines and driving, death rock informed punk beats. Tracks stick loyally to a typical rock format, but find space within this framework to articulate the essence of minimalism through aggressive, raw black metal derived riffs made accessible through decorative harmonic lines lifted from the goth tradition and refitted for the intensity of extreme metal. Bass and drums work very much within the punk mould, frenetically jumping between swinging and intense rhythmic sequences. Placed atop this architectural hardware is a further module of black metal aesthetics, rendering all with a glum, borderline tragedian air contrasting neatly with the playful delivery.
Sacreligious: Brutality Incarnated
Out 25th September, self-released
A somewhat unfocused debut manages to get by on sheer will and charm. Fluid and surprisingly sophisticated melodic passages ripped straight from the book of Morbid Angel are complemented by shades of black metal a-la Dissection. But Sacreligious seem to have one foot in hardcore, as slam breakdowns and punk rhythms frequently disrupt the flow. Whilst this can and does form a distinctive branch of death metal’s genealogy, here the disparate elements appear to be actively competing against one another. As if the members of this band were all keen to insert their specific influences without fully thinking through how they would service the whole, leading to ill thought out compromises that result in a lack of integration. One can only speculate. That being said, Sacreligious are not without identity. It’s refreshing to see artists still capable of framing melody as an act of aggression, imbuing even the most nuanced riffs with a hostility and evil demeanour without lapsing into heavy metal derived euphoria.
Windswept: A Sign of the Cloven Hoof
Out 25th September on Primitive Reaction
Side project of the perennially active Roman Saenko, Windswept finds this prolific musical character in a more melodic mood than Precambrian or Bras d’Honneur, with none of the cathartic sentiment of his most famous project in Drudkh, reconciling its melancholia with the much bleaker outlook of Hate Forest. The result is plodding, despairing black metal that at times could be construed as depressive were it not for the proactive rhythm section and a seasoning of more life affirming melodies. Despite these stylistic tweaks, anyone familiar with Saenko’s work will find few surprises at the structural level. This is sparse, landscaped black metal that seeks to present the listener with a vision of open spaces and solitude, but offers little attempt to populate this terrain with convincing developmental material, any sense of motion or narrative. But the environment as articulated remains compelling enough to get by without the need for elaboration. What we instead get is reflective, contemplative material, more active than pure ambience but still aggressively minimalist in nature.
Lord Gryphus: Summoning the King of the Dead
Out 25th September on Nespithe
There’s no denying just how lacklustre and unimaginative this material is, but it fails on much more straightforward terms than ninety percent of contemporary death metal. In a way this is refreshing. There is no need to perform another dissection to determine which OSDM trends are being tapped into here, or a more in depth analysis of overqualified cerebral musicians rendering an overcooked dissonant mess in the name of the avant-garde. Lord Gryphus are just fantastically and unequivocally boring. A hodgepodge of Unleashed, Autopsy, Incantation, and generic Swedeath. As a précis of death metal tropes it serves its purpose. Nothing is untoward or out of place, although perhaps an overreliance on meathead groove and jump-da-fuck riffs should raise some eyebrows. In a sense I find myself applauding Lord Gryphus for reminding me that failure can still be an honest pursuit, and doesn’t always require layers of analysis to truly understand. ‘Summoning the King of the Dead’ deserves plaudits for resurrecting the art of transparently flat, dull mediocrity.
Tårfödd: En känsla av hopplöshet
Out 28th September on Purity Through Fire
Formed in 2022 and already seven albums in, ‘En känsla av hopplöshet’ being the second released this year (so far), not to mention an album from this musician’s too-similar-for-comfort other project Grimveil, one has to wonder where some of these self-identifying “prolific” modern artists get their audacity from. Could some of this material not have been honed? Or utterly dispensed with as noble but flawed first drafts not fit for public consumption? What exactly is on offer here that cannot be found on any number of black metal releases this month? Generic, risk free black metal cut in the “post” mould, meaning no cadence goes unresolved, no melody feels intellectually or artistically threatening, nothing is ventured and nothing is gained. Songs move with all the jeopardy of a pop song, only gradations more tedious owing to the bloated length of these tracks.
Hardiesse: Tristesse vespérale
Out 30th September on Antiq
Just when I had pronounced medievally inclined French black metal as DOA, Hardiesse arrive with their debut EP to, if not redeem, then at least tempt one into looking again at this curious niche. Materially this is no different to melodic, folky black metal delivered in a knightly chivalry and Middle Age fable packaging. But Hardiesse are more deadpan in their delivery, restraining their flamboyant tendencies into tight hooks that manage to contain a rich colour palette full of subtle shading. This is still black metal at its most sugar coated and amenable. But this comes across as entirely intentional. The music is, after all, derived in part from medieval melodic lines, a lineage which brings it to the very genus of traditional song. Little wonder it feels lyrical, intuitive, and undeniably catchy. But unlike many attempts to integrate such domesticity into the realm of black metal, some thought has been put into injecting cement into the candy, bulking it out with sparsity, danger, an overall grander scope. Unlike Obsequiae who lean into melodic complexity by creating contrapuntal tapestries, Hardiesse flatten off the peaks and troughs via simple yet well presented tremolo riffs, allowing the music to flow in intuitive but not trite waves of cathartic energy.
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