Black Metal

A band literally out of time, ORGREL hail from Italy and, more importantly, hail the ancient days of black metal – the days too often forgotten, in the late ’90s, when labels like Solistitium, Sombre, and Drakkar began releasing obsidian gems during the genre’s post-sensationalism fallout. Rich with righteous fury and triumph alike, the power-trio deliver their first public recording, the full-length Red Dragon’s Invocation. Immediately, mystical splendor and dizzying delirium are felt as ORGREL kick in with an impassioned surge, each and every riff, rhythm, and holler stirring bloodlust and wonder/wander simultaneously. The soundfield is studiously raw yet robust, flat but somehow full, allowing aggression and atmosphere equal reign, and engrossing the listener to the very last: indeed, Red Dragon’s Invocation is summarily titled. Its mysteries are starkly simple but exceedingly sublime, being purely and totally BLACK METAL in word and deed; black metal doesn’t need to “become” anything when it already IS. ORGREL know this intrinsic truth and pursue it to the hilt across their debut album.

Graced with absolutely stunning cover artwork by Luciana Nedelea, ORGREL raise their sword of truth and prepare to strike unbelievers with Red Dragon’s Invocation.

Black Metal

Building upon that grand fortress is a four-song/22-minute mini-album likewise truly titled: The Oath of the Black Wolf. Here, ORGREL have gone a-hunting, their ’90s black metal classicism stalking and striking with a hunger only hinted at previously. Still, fueled by this fire they may be, the Italians across this mini manage to maximize their epic side, with the predecessor’s flat-yet-full soundfield now becoming slightly more chromatic in the process. Lead lines portend dark truths, ever building in tension and then grandeur, but the record’s swift-yet-satisfying runtime reveals the darkest, most intrinsic truth: black metal doesn’t need to “become” anything when it already IS. Hail The Oath of the Black Wolf!

Black Metal

In little more than two years, this Belarusian enigma has built a sizable (and starkly terrifying) catalog, culminating in last year’s critically acclaimed Church of Bones debut album and, earlier this year, the Cryptic Rites of Necromancy EP, all under the aegis of IRON BONEHEAD. Thus far, PA VESH EN has exhibited a stark ‘n’ unsettling style of black metal: from stifled-violence miserablism to seemingly formless drift, from bent-askew melodicism to echo-chamber murk, always with a tortured soul guiding everything, he’s almost effortlessly created a soundworld beyond compare – and has done so with the restlessness of a lost specter.

Black Metal

Now arrives Church of Bones, proving with no small amount of finality that PA VESH EN is creating some of the most mysterious and vital black metal of modern times. At seven songs spanning 37 minutes, Church of Bones feels far more vast than its otherwise-compact runtime suggests. If the preceding split with TEMPLE MOON marked a momentous shift toward total and utter desolation, then PA VESH EN dives deepest – and equally, both in manner and quality – into both the fog and the murk here, further developing that malodorous melodicism that likewise crept forth on the split. Returning to misery and comfort (and the comfort of misery), the long ‘n’ languorous landscapes laid out across Church of Bones beckon the listener in a most seductive manner, all before those cursed tendrils ensnare the subconscious and suck it dry, any last semblance of hope extinguished. This celestial drift-unto-descent feels somewhat familiar in the grand scheme of black metal which uses rawness as a weapon, and yet there’s that elusive X-factor (or, literally, just literal elusiveness) that makes PA VESH EN sound completely and utterly ALIEN.

Black Metal

Striking while the iron’s hot, Order of Vengeance follows less than a year after RUNESPELL’s critically acclaimed debut album, Unhallowed Blood Oath, also released by IRON BONEHEAD. Let it be known, however, that there’s not one sacrifice in quality to be found here. If anything, the RUNESPELL aesthetic has become even more iron-girded and iron-willed. There’s a greater sense of urgency on Order of Vengeance – an unquenchable desperation, even – that drives these no-less-grand epics. Whereas Unhallowed Blood Oath situated itself on an axis of melancholy vs. bloodlust, suitably, Order of Vengeance ups the bloodlust considerably…although, of course, the melancholy is no short supply here, particularly on the sparse ‘n’ haunting instrumental “Night’s Gate.” The album length, too, has been padded out to a spacious and all-enveloping 47 minutes, allowing the full mesmerizing grandeur of the RUNEPSPELL aesthetic to take root and consume. More massive, yet more urgent: Order of Vengeance is indeed a new order.

Black Metal

By now, RUNESPELL should require little introduction. Since this Australian entity’s public unveiling in 2017 with the Aeons of Ancient Blood demo – released by IRON BONEHEAD, as well as all successive recordings – RUNESPELL has sharpened its sword and quickly, with three albums arriving like clockwork every year: Unhallowed Blood Oath (2017), Order of Vengeance (2018), and Voice of Opprobrium (2019). Although 2020 didn’t see the release of a full-length, a split album with the reanimated Forest Mysticism tided over the bloodthirsty until the arrival of fourth LP Verses in Regicide in 2021, arguably RUNESPELL’s best-produced and -executed album to date.

Black Metal

TROLLDOM is a name that goes back many years. While the band’s date of origin is unknown, the first demo, Av gudablod röd…, was released in 2016. That TROLLDOM played authentically vintage second-wave black metal should hardly be suprising considering it came under the banner of Ancient Records linchpin Swartadauþuz (Azelisassath, Bekëth Nexëhmü, Muvitium, Greve, MUSMAHHU, Digerdöden, Gnipahålan, Mystik, Summum, Daudadagr). Back then, his rabidly prolific nature was just starting to blossom, and TROLLDOM was yet another new-yet-old creation that contributed to his wider cosmology whilst standing on its own.

Black Metal

TROLLDOM is a name that goes back many years. While the band’s date of origin is unknown, the first demo, Av gudablod röd…, was released in 2016. That TROLLDOM played authentically vintage second-wave black metal should hardly be surprising considering it came under the banner of Ancient Records linchpin Swartadauþuz (Azelisassath, Bekëth Nexëhmü, Muvitium, Greve, MUSMAHHU, Digerdöden, Gnipahålan, Mystik, Summum, Daudadagr). Back then, his rabidly prolific nature was just starting to blossom, and TROLLDOM was yet another new-yet-old creation that contributed to his wider cosmology whilst standing on its own.

Black Metal

TROLLDOM is a name that goes back many years. While the band’s date of origin is unknown, the first demo, Av gudablod röd…, was released in 2016. That TROLLDOM played authentically vintage second-wave black metal should hardly be surprising considering it came under the banner of Ancient Records linchpin Swartadauþuz (Azelisassath, Bekëth Nexëhmü, Muvitium, Greve, MUSMAHHU, Digerdöden, Gnipahålan, Mystik, Summum, Daudadagr). Back then, his rabidly prolific nature was just starting to blossom, and TROLLDOM was yet another new-yet-old creation that contributed to his wider cosmology whilst standing on its own.