Valdur : "Pathetic Scum"

They are back and bringing it harder. If you have been hung up on the False album, here is the really shit you need to check out. Cavernous and roaring. They have more than one way to crush you. The vocals are low both tonally and in the mix. They are not the prominent element to their sound, but serve the purpose  in the depths of this pit of primal power.  Crushing is often over used description of extreme metal, here it is actually fitting , though they still have ghostly echoes of atmosphere in the distance. The jack hammer start of "Impending Doom" can be migraine inducing. I don't feel it's as nuanced song writing as the opener, the vocals shift into more of a coarse cry. Then the blasting really starts on "Blessings of the Goat". The drumming gets really thundering, but it's it's not until everything slows in the final two minutes that it really finds its footing. The vocal variance is subtle and can get lost in this storm but it's there.  The chanted part really works well.

The title track kinda becomes a blur until the synths soften the back drop a little and the drums go into the more tribal pound. The militant beat it opens with goes unnoticed until the second listen. Once the song really kicks in the double bass to blast momentum takes you away. While it's more of an interlude the synth break down in "Incantre pt2" is very creative and a nice touch. It's bookended by to metal sections so it might be one of the oddest black metal instrumentals. The album closes with the somewhat more straight forward "Morbid Emanations" though it does have a layer of creepy guitar running along side it's more traditional metal path, there is one riff that reminds me of old Morbid Angel. They use atmosphere well in this song to throw you a sonic curve ball and it envelopes the metal swallowing it.

This is a step forward sonically for this band, sometimes it gets so heavy until its more of a vibration than a song, which is the only pit fall to daring to be that heavy you sacrifice musicality though I think they proved on the first song they could do it which set the part so high for the rest of the album I'll give this one an 8.5 for that reason. If you wanting something that kicks your face in and willing to disregard the finer points of musicality then round it up another point.


This monsterpiece comes out June 3Oth on Bloody Mountain Records.