(written by Islander)
“With a name like Witchgöat, it’s safe to say we are probably not dealing with the latest Avant-Garde, Prog Metal sensation to sweep through the scene. Instead, these Salvadorians lay waste to everyone and everything in sight with their brand of Blackened Death/Thrash.”
That’s how NCS writer Todd Manning began his review of Witchgöat’s debut album Egregores of the Black Faith more than seven years ago. But he also took pains to point out that “while Witchgöat certainly owe a debt to ripping Black Metal, tons of molten Old School Metal and Thrash slag flow through their veins”, and that they achieved “a striking balance between brutality and memorability”.
In 2023 Witchgöat followed up with their second album, Altars of Necromancy, and it was an even more multi-faceted and eye-opening experience (one for which we hosted the premiere of a demonically wild and devilishly hypnotic song called “Rejected by the Demiurge“).
And now Witchgöat are coming back at us again, with a third album named Serpent Hordes that their new label Personal Records will co-release with Morbid Skull Records on December 4th. And we are again in the fortunate position of getting to premiere one of the new songs — “Storming the Walls of Eternity“.
We’ll precede the music with this excerpt from the press materials about the album circulated on behalf of Personal Records:
Not only does its release mark the 10th anniversary of the band, but more importantly, the album successfully captures the essence of WITCHGÖAT and reflects the maturity and balance the members have achieved as musicians. With almost alchemical magick — or perhaps a particularly effective time-machine — the quartet incorporate trace elements of classic Swordmaster, Dissection, Lord Belial, Sweden’s Crown Of Thorns, and the culter likes of fellow Swedes Cardinal Sin and Raise Hell while keeping a ripping-forth-from-Hell atmosphere of Pleasure to Kill-era Kreator.
A head-spinning list of influences for sure, but when you hear the new album it will all make sense. And now, onward we go to join the band in “Storming the Walls of Eternity“.
That’s an ambitious name for a song, isn’t it? But that’s actually what the music sounds like. In its opening phase, with drums pounding and an absolutely blistering voice screaming fire, the music immediately reaches towering heights. The sound is brazen, blazing, and vast, yet the mood it carries is distressing, even beleaguered, like the fraught nature of massed forces facing an extremely daunting challenge.
The drums momentously boom and cymbals clatter as the whirring riffage soars high and tumultuously writhes, and the full-force bloodthirstiness of the vocals remains frightening. As the song builds, it ultimately reaches an astonishing pinnacle of stirring intensity, thanks to a soul-piercing extended guitar solo that dramatically soars and dives, wails and screams.
In its closing phase the music boils over, rhythmically thundering and musically convulsing in a way that spawns mental images of violence and torment, of pain and perseverance. Witchgöat have a proven capacity to deliver ripping black thrash, but this song shows another, and more haunting, dimension of their talents.
Personal Records will release Serpent Hordes on CD and digital formats, while Morbid Skull Records will handle the cassette tape edition. Find pre-orders via the links below, and also lend your ears to our stream of the album’s previously released title song.
PRE-ORDER:
https://www.personal-records.com/product/pre-order-witchgoat-serpent-hordes-cd/
https://personal-records.bandcamp.com/album/serpent-hordes
https://www.morbidskullrecords.com/
https://morbidskull.bandcamp.com/album/serpent-hordes-2026
WITCHGÖAT:
https://www.facebook.com/witchgoatsv