(written by Islander)
Last month we had the pleasure of premiering the second single from Awakening of Ancient Evil, the second full-length from the Finnish black/thrash duo Disembody. It’s set for release by Helldprod Records on November 4th (tomorrow!), but you can listen to it in its entirety now through our album premiere below.
The label has summed up the music as “raw, vicious and uncanny” — “eight tracks packed with hellish aggression, piercing riffs, and relentless pounding evilness,” leavened with “haunting melodies [that] will lull you into a dark slumber.”
That is accurate and succinct, but of course we have more elaborate thoughts of our own to share about this very remarkable album.
Just a quick glance at the track list provides a clue that Disembody’s ambitions are more expansive than their genre label of “black/thrash” might suggest. Two of the songs hit the eight-minute mark; the opener “Witchhammer” exceeds seven minutes; and none of the songs is shorter than four.
That “Witchhammer” song makes a hell of an opening statement. The sound is sharp, clear, and powerful. The riffing and the drumwork are both electrifying. And the clarity of the production makes it possible to hear how agile and vivid the bass performance is, even in the midst of so many other ingredients that compel attention in this wild romp.
Those other ingredients include beautifully harmonized guitar-leads that fluidly swirl like sonic sorcery and ecstatically quiver, as well as serrated-edge vocals that sound like a malignant gargoyle brought to life, and razor-sharp shifts in the riffing and the melodies that generate sensations which are hellish, occult, and brazenly grand.
In one fell swoop, Disembody prove their capacity for creating guitar spectacles in multiple dimensions, while simultaneously inflicting diabolical vocal barbarity and rhythms that will get listeners’ muscles compulsively twitching.
They follow “Witchhammer” with the song we premiered — “Dweller of Abyssal Waters“. With drums heavily pounding and those malicious vocals rabidly gnashing, they inflict roiling riffage that feels like a whirlpool of knives, punctuated by swirling, pulsating arpeggios that sound fiendishly ecstatic.
The music channels hellish grandeur — it vibrantly gleams as well as rips, and the contortions are fiery. But near the song’s mid-point Disembody add another dimension, an exotic lead-guitar melody that makes one think of ancient Mesopotamian sorcerers, or the performance of snake charmers. The soloing also carries that esoteric and seductive melody forward in vibrantly flickering tones.
And then Disembody return to us another dose of black-thrashing viciousness at the end, one last rampant burst of high-octane and heavily hammering energy. But it’s that exotic melody that’s likely to be what causes the song to get stuck most firmly in listeners’ heads.
Over and over again in subsequent songs Disembody prove their talent for infiltrating exotic (and fiendish) melodies into their hard-charging attacks. The ultra-speedy fretwork is technically very impressive, and the layering of the guitar parts is beautifully conceived and calculated, even though the results are impressively wild.
Those two eight-minute songs deserve specific attention. The mid-paced “God of Funerary Rites” is well-named. It creates a break in the hell-for-leather momentum of the three opening songs, and it’s the place where you’ll first understand the label’s references to “haunting melodies [that] will lull you into a dark slumber”. That song’s instrumental overture is indeed haunting, and melancholy.
Disembody then seamlessly carry the melody forward when all the instruments arrive — though the mood becomes less melancholy and more sinister. Once again they also bring in exotic melodic variations and soloing filigrees of the kind we described earlier with references to ancient Mesopotamian sorcerers and snake-charmers. This time a bass solo creates one of those variations following another haunting phase (accented by whispered gasps).
This is how Disembody make use of their extended run-times, not only by creating changes of pace and mood but also by introducing multiple variations in their main melodic theme — without losing the thread.
The other long song is the title track, which closes the album. As in “God of Funerary Rites“, this one has a haunting kind of overture — but it’s again esoteric in its mood, and that melody is again one that Disembody carry forward through adaptations as they fire up the song’s rhythmic drive and move it through mid-paced momentum into a hammering gallop.
By the time the song has shifted into a bracing gallop, the riffing and the soloing feel like the sonic equivalent of whirling dervishes overcome by their mysteries and lost in their ecstasies — dervishes that levitate as well as spin. Further variations ensue, but Disembody let loose the dervishes again in the song’s final moments, making for an exhilarating finish to an exhilarating (and fascinating) album.
Now we’ll step aside and let you experience all the music for yourselves (if you haven’t started already!).
Awakening of Ancient Evil was recorded at Äänipanimo studio and it was recorded, mixed, and mastered by Tatu Säteri. The startling front cover is a painting by Aarno Karimo, a Finnish artist, in 1929-1932.
Helldprod will release the album on CD and digital formats, and it’s available for pre-order now.
PRE-ORDER:
https://helldprod.com/shop/index.php
https://helldprod.bandcamp.com/album/disembody-awakening-of-ancient-evil
DISEMBODY:
https://disembodyband.bandcamp.com/
https://www.facebook.com/Disembodymetal/