Spite : "the Third Temple"

 The guitars have a cleaner tone than the buzzing razor-sharp distortion that coats the tremolo-picked riffs of most black metal bands. There are some thrashy stomps on the second song, but the big takeaway here is this is not just a blast fest, but this guy cares about writing songs so even the rasped vocals fall over the riffs with a great deal of purpose. "Under the Wings of the Cherubim" finds more speed being poured one which tends to lean more in the direction of what you typically expect from black metal these days and the first two songs prove this project is capable of more. 

"Yahweh's Vengence" works off of a hooky more death metal-like riff, that proves to be very effective. It works better than "Desert Demons" which follows it as it does not revert back to blast beats to break up the song, so the riffs do not become a mush of sound. "Hounds of Hatred" cranks by with a wrathful attitude. Nothing latches onto me from it, becomes more background music. "Spoils of Judea" is a little more intentional, and has more of a thrashing swing to it, but falls short of taking the kind of chances heard in the first few songs. 

"Where Dust Cannot Fall" is the first song where I had to go back and give another listen as it just kind of faded into the background and I stopped paying as close attention. It's pretty middle-of-the-road black metal, the vocals begin to lose their flare at this point in the album and begin to get a little redundant. "The Black Moon" continues to find the album heading in a more straightforward black metal direction even with the melodic themes in the riffing. There is a little more thrash in the veins of "the Stone of Sakrah. It carries an angular groove, and the bass comes forward in the mix to give a little more of a backbone, anytime you can hear the bass in black metal I am a fan.

"The Dark Ark" is darker and carries more purpose, making it a catchier song. There is also a darker undercurrent to the last song, but it is less purposeful, in fact, the drumming is pretty chaotic, thus leading the song all over the place. I will give this album an 8.5, they sometimes take more chances than your average black metal bands, then conform the rest of the time, but pull everything off in a way that works. This is unleashed by Invictus Productions on September 27th. 

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