(Andy Synn bows down before the timeless Black Metal magic of Vimur)
Now, according to official sources, the new album from US Black Metal warriors Vimur is scheduled for release this Friday.
But, apparently, it’s already available digitally via the group’s own Bandcamp page (with physical copies to follow via Avantgarde Music shortly).
So, here’s a little review to help clear up any confusion and encourage you all to check it out.
Last time we wrote about Vimur we (specifically, me) identified their epic third album, Transcendental Violence as being the band’s best work yet.
And while that’s still just about true, Timeless Everpresent is very much a close second place in their already impressive discography and finds the band committing even more heavily to their signature brand of mercilessly melodic, post-Immortal intensity.
True, the opening instrumental intro of “Resacralization” feels a little superfluous, but as soon as the freezing hooks and fleet-footed drums of “Fire, Glory and Thinking” – a song more than capable of giving the band’s Canadian cousins in Spectral Wound a run for their money – kick in you can just feel Timeless Everpresent take off for the stratosphere… and it never looks back.
If anything, the album then ups the ante with the heavier and increasingly aggressive assault of “Sons of Another Light” and brooding bombast of “Wound Window” with both the former’s scorching energy and soaring solo and the latter’s grimly infectious grooves (including some subtly intricate bass-work) recalling the bloodily anthemic style of Necrophobic at their best.
Let me be clear though, while Vimur are confident enough to pay homage to their influences here and there, without feeling like they’re being overshadowed or subsumed by them, this album is less about paying tribute to specific peers and predecessors and more about honouring the unique, untameable… and, yes, timeless… spirit of Black Metal, while also reaffirming Vimur‘s own place among the pantheon of the immortals.
Sure, its quest to scale the black mountain doesn’t always go smoothly – “Fortress of a New Faith” in particular seems to stumble over its own feet a little – but the record’s triumphant finale, beginning with the moody and utterly mesmerising strains of “The Embrace of Merciless Intensity” and concluding with the icy torrent of razor-edged riff work and nigh-on unrelenting drumming of epic closer “Astride the Centuries”, finds the group continuing to ascend to new heights of blackened brilliance and imperious intensity.
2024 looks set to be a very good year for the more unashamedly melodic and heroic side of Black Metal, with the new Kvaen already making waves and new albums from Wormwitch and the aforementioned Spectral Wound on the horizon, but I’m going to put it out there that Timeless Everpresent may well end up being the purist’s preference and the cult connoisseur’s choice… if they’re willing to give it the chance it deserves.