Arcana 13 : "Danza Macabra"

Comprised of members from Mnemic and Void of Sleep and like many Italian metal bands finds inspiration from the countries cult horror movie scene. There brand of doom draws influence from the throne of Sabbath and some of it's earliest worshippers such as Pentagram. So there is often a rock boogie feel to it. The opener is well done , but sticks pretty close to a color by numbers blue print. So going into this album what I am listening for is where they stray from that and show me who they are . The songs are typically bookended by pieces of horror movie atmosphere. The pace picks up going into the second song to give it a heavier Electric Wizard like intensity. I think "Land of Revenge" is a stronger song as the vocals have more purpose , where they seemed to be obligatory on the first two songs. Vocally things are song in a very plaintive tenor that recalls middle of the road 70's hard rock like Blue Oyster Cult.


They turn a darker and more melodic corner at the beginning of " Oblivion Mushroom" before it's business as usual for this sort of thing and they are chugging the same path paved by Iommi. The Suspiria theme song that is a cover of Goblin's version, not not the albums high point. The riff to "Blackmaster" has more groove to it , the vocals to do ride it as gracefully as they could. They don't wow me until we get to the song "Holy Cult of Suicide". Then everything clicks in place and I'm wondering , now why hasn't there been more of this ? "Hell Behind You" continues to find the band showing their true selves as the dive down deeper into more melodic territory. The vocals sound like the guy is using his real voice and not trying to front a Blue Oyster Cult, even when they hit the "Mississippi Queen" section of the song and boogie down. The album does hit these two glorious songs in the final act, but is also bogged down by typical retro metal, so I'll give it a 7.5, which shows these guys have promise and if this is your kind of party and you don't need much more then you might even round it up.