(written by Islander)
Every one of us follows a personal collection of bands who by our lights just never stumble. They may be ground-breakers or they may not. They may make bold steps from one record to the next or they may only iterate subtly. But over and over again, long enough to build our confidence, they create music that gets its hooks in our heads, rings our chimes (pick your own metaphor), reinforces the conviction that whatever they do next, the odds are high it will be well worth the time (and the money).
In my case the Bavarian band Blackevil are one of those groups. To borrow some words I’ve written before, their past music has been a black-thrashing devil-rush, high-grade adrenaline fuel but laced with an atmosphere of magic and menace. While drawing from well-springs of primal Teutonic thrash and the greats of speed metal, they also bring into play the epic fireworks of classic heavy metal and add mystic instrumental nuances, creating anthems of devilish glory and blood-rushing ecstasy.
They’ve been doing this long enough now, and getting better and better at it with each release, that people like me become greedily excited when seeing the news that they’ve got something new on the horizon. And the horizon is very near now, because on October 25th Dying Victims Productions will release the band’s spectacular third album, Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament, which you’ll be able to hear in full today.
To state the case more clearly, Blackevil have a deserved reputation for giving people a savagely good time, by providing high-octane, pulse-pounding, hell-raising musical experiences. But as the new album demonstrates more abundantly than even the records they’ve previously released, Blackevil continue finding new ways to pop eyes open (and even to make you think!), by going beyond the fundamental and expected tropes of horn-throwing, black/thrashing speed — so much so that they truly have now clearly transcended the “blackthrash” label.
In other words, the seven songs on the new album aren’t just seven slight variations on the same repeating formula. They have common features, but the common features aren’t the kind that make the songs sound alike.
Those common features include technically impressive performance skill, a knack for songwriting that makes a fine home for hooks, and a rebel-angel spirit that relishes evil visions. It’s what they do with those common qualities, and how they vary what they do, which makes the album such a cloven-hoofed kick to hear.
For sure, Blackevil still rev their engines into the red zone, drums hammering, bass vividly thrusting, fire-borne riffs pulsing and quivering, and voices savagely screaming to high heaven. In songs like album opener “Timeless Throne” and “Praise the Fire for the Sacrament” they build toward exultant frenzies, and it’s wild when they do, but the production is so clean, the roles so evenly put forward, that half the fun is appreciating the sharpness of the execution and the elaborateness of the layers in creating such abundant thrills.
Even at their most propulsive, Blackevil switch things up, elegantly evolving their evil-hooked riffs, up-shifting and down-shifting, and spiraling in melodic leads and diabolical solos that make the music even more glorious and magical. The band also bring in vocal variations, roaring and growling and fanatically yelling as well as shrieking, and they also fill the songs with a multitude of bass-and-drum variations.
What we might call “classic heavy metal” or even “NWOBHM” (for want of better terms) play prominent roles, giving songs such as “Divine Forces” and “The Gladiator” an extravagant, almost “sword and sorcery” feel, and others such as the mid-paced “Beneath This Pentagram” an atmosphere of otherworldly and even gothic seductiveness and sinister menace.
Other variations: The afore-mentioned “Praise the Fire for the Sacrament” has an opening that put me in mind of Led Zeppelin, and includes ingredients of melodic black metal (and a jaw-dropping bass performance); it also reaches truly epic heights of blazing magnificence.
The also afore-mentioned “The Gladiator” also includes distinctive variations that sound like horn fanfares or the accompaniment for spinning and levitating dervishes, and closes with the clash of swords and a moody bass solo, while “Unknown Hands” leans even further into mythic and melodic black metal, but also includes instrumental melodies that resemble elven pipes as well as female choral voices.
Well, and how many black/thrashing or speed metal bands close their albums with an 11-minute song? Blackevil do that with “Towards the Carpathian Winter Battle”, a truly epic and even solemnly reverential song that includes mournful strings, dark and despairing melodies, and grieving bass tones — as well as torrid vocal intensity, outbursts of blast-beat fury, catastrophic bomb bursts, swarms of trem-picked riffage that sound like a desperate fight, and flights of wondrous spectacle. And a medieval sounding acoustic finale surrounded by rolling thunder.
Yes indeed, it really won’t do to call Blackevil a “blackthrash” band any more, not because they’ve completely abandoned that style but because their new album is sooo much more than that. Discover for yourselves:
LINE-UP:
Abyss – ghoulish throat of revenge and roaring 4-string hell
Deathinfektor – attack of the iron six-string saw
Bloodhammer – glorifier of the infernal wardrum thunder
Dying Victims will release Praise the Communion Fire for the Unhallowed Sacrament on CD and vinyl LP formats. The fantastic cover art is again the work of the great Paolo Girardi.
PRE-ORDER:
https://dyingvictimsproductions.bandcamp.com/album/praise-the-communion-fire-for-the-unhallowed-sacrament
https://dyingvictims.com/
BLACKEVIL:
https://www.facebook.com/blackevilmetal
http://www.blackevil.net/