(Andy Synn brings us three more examples of The Best of British from the year so far)
As some of you may know, a couple of weeks back I attended an excellent all-dayer featuring some of the very best of the UK Black Metal scene, two of whom – Andracca and Devastator – I subsequently decided I wanted to write some more about here, in the hopes of introducing them to at least a few new listeners.
And for the third artist/album – because all good things come in threes, right? – I’ve selected the debut album from a bunch of up-and-coming Souther sludge-slingers by the name of Verminthrone, who I predict you’re going to be hearing quite a bit more from over the next few years.
So, without further ado, let’s dig into another edition of “The Best of British”, shall we?
ANDRACCA – TO BARE THE WEIGHT OF DEATH
As I stated above, I recently caught Andracca live as part of a big Black Metal all-dayer, and was so impressed I decided I really wanted to write about them.
I was especially impressed by just how energetic and spontaneous their performance felt (especially when compared with a certain other set, which – while unquestionably polished – felt much more like the band in question were simply going through the motions) and was hopeful that their recently-released second album (their first new material since 2020’s Universal Language of Suffering EP) would capture at least some of their live presence.
Well, lucky me, because To Bare the Weight of Death (grammatically questionable title aside) does just that over the course of its six formidable tracks, none of which feel over-wrought or over-thought (though there’s clearly a lot of care gone into their construction) but instead give you the sense of a band following their creative instincts without doubting or second-guessing themselves.
The opening title-track (which grammatically-speaking, still gives me pause) is a perfect example of this, balancing dashes of dissonance and flashes of melody as part of its dark, atmosphere-heavy sound, propelled by frequent bursts of blistering speed and punctuated by occasional moments of moody groove (accentuated by some suitably brooding bass-work) which – while not exactly reinventing the wheel by any means – successfully manages to keep you on the edge of your seat throughout its almost seven-minute run-time.
The rest of the album – from the wheeling leads and reeling hooks of “Rise, Or Be Forever Fall’n” and the raw melodic fury of “Oceans of Fire” (which, again, benefits from some subtly impressive bass work) through the seething “Antithesis of Hope” and the melancholy “Lamentation of Divinity” all the way to the gloomy finale of closer “Hollow Altars” – pretty much follows suit, and while this means that the band’s blastbeat-dominant approach might benefit from a bit more variety going forwards (with the aforementioned ending to “Hollow Altars” suggesting that Andracca are perfectly capable of slowing the pace without sacrificing their intensity) it still manages to capture a lot of their live electricity and, for that, it must be commended.
DEVASTATOR – CONJURERS OF CRUELTY
Let’s get one thing straight – Devastator are not the sort of band you want to listen to if you’re expecting any real surprises or shocking twists or to have your expectations challenged, and just one look at just some of the bands they list as influences – Sodom, Venom, Bathory, Watain, Motörhead – should already give you a pretty good idea of what they’re going to sound like.
But while Devastator might not be doing anything particularly distinct or different, that’s not so much of a problem when they’re doing it with such gusto, with the killer early combo of “Conjurers of Cruelty” and “Black Witchery” – all frantic, high-speed Black-Thrash riff-wizardry and shamelessly OTT leads, all topped off with a bevy of barking vocals hooks (these guys, very much to their credit, are definitely fans of a big, punky, and instantly-memorable chorus) – and the significantly darker and heavier “Ritual of Abuse” (which ends with a surprisingly intricate bit of acoustic guitar work) quickly setting the tone, and the bar, for the rest of the album.
It’s not a perfect album, by any means – the drumming, while not bad in any way, sometimes feels more like it’s just following the lead of the guitars rather than propelling them forward, and the whole middle section of the album (up to and including the overly drawn-out “Deathspell Defloration”) does tend to all run together a little over the course of multiple listens – but when it hits its stride, as it does in triumphant fashion with the closing trio of the riff-tastic “Bestial Rites”, the hook-heavy “Sharpen the Blade”, and outlandish eight minute closer “Rabid Morbid Death” (which suggests that the band may yet have bigger, better things in mind for the future), you’ll be hard-pressed not bang your head like a maniac… whether you want to or not.
Sure, they’re not doing anything that other bands haven’t done before… heck, I’m not sure they’re doing anything that some other bands aren’t doing right now… but they’re still doing it damn well, all the same, and while I don’t perhaps rate them quite as highly as some other writers may have (I’m sure that, with very little effort, you could find a heap of 09/10 or 10/10 reviews for this floating around), I have no doubt that a lot of our readers will love them all the same!
VERMINTHRONE – THE CULL
Some people say that making a good first impression is the most important thing. Others say that it’s the way you follow it up that really counts.
Well, Buckinghamshire bruisers Verminthrone are kind of having to do both with their debut album, The Cull, as while it’s their first full-length release (and, thus, likely to be the first time a lot of listeners encounter their particularly brand of sludgy grooves and ugly aggression) it’s also the follow-up to their well-received 2022 EP, Kingdom of Worms, which means at least some people probably have some pretty big expectations of the band.
Thankfully it soon becomes clear, not long into terrifically-titled opener “Don’t Trust Morning People” in fact, that the group are more than up to the task of delivering the sort of thick, meaty slabs of riffage and hefty helpings of gnarly hooks that fans of the likes of EyeHateGod, Down, and Crowbar will be hungry to get their teeth into.
And while that means that Verminthrone are still pretty heavily indebted to their predecessors and progenitors – something which, I have to guess, none of the band would deny (and why should they?) – I doubt anyone will really be too concerned by this, especially when they’ve got succulent morsels like the all-killer, no-killer, fat-free ground ‘n’ pound of “Kuru” and the virulent nastiness of “Pulling Teeth (Spitting Blood)” to satisfy their appetite for all things down and dirty and dripping with venom.
Most interesting of all, however – to me, anyway – are those moments where the band demonstrate their willingness to shake things up a little, with the eerily calm penultimate passage of the previously mentioned “Don’t Trust Morning People” (which sets the scene for the song’s irresistibly infectious finale) and the menacing mid-section of “Youth for Euthanasia” (another definite highlight) showcasing just how much their songwriting skills (and their confidence) have come on in the last few years.