By: Richard Maw
Album Type: Full Length
Date Released: 20/07/2018
Label: Prosthetic Records
The band has done something that not many bands can
pull off, they have changed their style and made a very good record.
“Devouring
Radiant Light” CD//DD//LP track listing:
1). Fen of Shadows
2). When Paradise
Fades
3). Temple
of the Sun
4). Devouring Radiant Light
5). The Luminous Sky
6). The Vault
7). Carnarium Eternal
8). Sacred Soil
The Review:
This
is a turn up for the books. Skeletonwitch, purveyors of the finest
blackened thrash, return with their first full length release with a new
vocalist and... They have changed. “The
Apothic Gloom” hinted at this; longer songs, less thrashing and so on.
Well, once “Fen of Shadows” gets
going it does thrash, but it mostly black-metals (not a verb) throughout its
considerable eight minute playing time. The track, really, is black metal of
the modern variety.
There
is a lot of riffage to get your teeth into on “When Paradise Fades”, but the
riffs are more melancholic, less brutal, less aggressive. This isn't as serious
a volte face as Paradise
Lost after “Draconian Times”
or anything, but this is certainly a different record from what can only be
viewed as a different band.
The
material here is uniformly of high quality and there are blasts, melodic riffs,
excellent vocals and state of the art drums aplenty. How this will go over with
the band's fan base is another matter. “Temple of the Sun” ups the thrash quota
effectively and this is not Wolves In The Throne Room or anything like
that, but the raw aggression of previous albums has been smoothed off- no rough
edges here. The title track even has a clean intro- and slow pacing!
As
the album enters the back stretch, the stylistic shift is cemented and there is
no going back to the sound of “Breathing
The Fire” et al. The triplet time feel of “The Vault” is great, the track sprawling and full of great riffs
and performances. The three minute burn of “Carnarium Eternal” is the closest thing here to anything off “Serpents Unleashed” or “Beyond The Permafrost” and really lets
rip with the killer riffs and changes. By the time of “Sacred Soil”, the band has done something that not many bands can pull
off. They have changed their style and made a very good record.
Whether
this is a record that fans of Skeletonwitch want to hear is another matter.
Metal fans are notoriously traditional in their wants and needs from certain
bands. I confess that this is very unlikely to usurp “Serpents Unleashed” or even “Forever
Abomination” from my playlist, but that is just me- I want blackened
thrash... I want Skeletonwitch to play it. The change here is akin to Belphegor
just becoming a straightforward black metal band and foregoing all the death
metal elements of their sound. Make no mistake, this record is a victory but
only time will tell if is a pyrrhic one in terms of the band's fan-base. Try it
out as you may well love what they have done here; just forget their past.
“Devouring Radiant Light” is available here
Band
info: bandcamp || facebook
