AN NCS PREMIERE: PYROMANCER — “VOLCANIC RAPTURE”

(written by Islander)

The name Pyromancer rang bells around here when news of their forthcoming debut album broke, but they were distant bells, even though their resonance was ruinous. Looking back, we had a burst of posts in 2015 about Pyromancer‘s debut demo and then Kaptain Carbon‘s review of their performance at the spring 2016 Blood of the Wolf Fest in their hometown of Lexington, Kentucky.

Almost a decade has passed since then, an almost incomprehensible amount of time given the rushing pace of changes in almost every aspect of life over those years. Pyromancer did finally re-surface last year with a pair of songs on a split with Detroit’s Perversion released by Godz Ov War, and now comes the debut album, aptly named Absolute Dominion By Fire, set for release next month by Adirondack Black Mass.

The same two terrorizing dominators are still in charge — Master of Graveyard Torment (drums, vocals) and Conqueror Horus (guitars, vocals) — and as you’ll learn from the album track we’re premiering today, they haven’t backed off or backed down from igniting black/death conflagrations – bizarre black/death conflagrations.

Just like the band’s own name and the title of their new album, the name of the song you’re about to hear is authentically evocative: “Volcanic Rapture“.

Following a momentously booming and scathing introduction (like an earthquake preceding the eruption), the music explodes in a torrent of obliterating drums and maniacally boiling guitars that are both abrasively gritty and sharply piercing. Malignant howls and maddened screams add to the belligerent heat of the musical vulcanism, and it all does sound destructively ecstatic.

But then we get a reminder of something that has tended to set Pyromancer aside from run-of-the-mill bestial black/death bands — a penchant for skull-clobbering, neck-moving grooves, freakish fretwork convulsions, and rapidly changing drum progressions.

The music sizzles and sears, pounds and blasts, spasms and slaughters, and the tandem of gruesome gutturals and deranged screams is every bit as insane as everything else. Well, maybe not as insane as the weirdly wailing, supernaturally contorting, and poisonously slithering guitar solo that spears the ears in the final minute. If that doesn’t leave you with a crazed smile on your own face, we’ll be surprised.

And that solo is a reminder of something else that sets Pyromancer apart in their beastly sub-genre, and even more so on this new album: They’re fiendishly inventive and adventurous, bizarre as well as ruthlessly barbaric, and they pack a hell of a lot into their compact songs.

Adirondack Black Mass will release Absolute Dominion By Fire on May 9th, on CD and cassette tape formats, and it’s recommended for fans of old Profanatica, Mystifier, Rotting Christ, and Order From Chaos. Pre-orders should be available soon at the label’s Big Cartel.

We’re also including a stream of a previously released song from the album, “Perverse Immolation“. It’s even more tempo-dynamic than the song we’ve premiered, and an eerie musical apparition as well as a catastrophic, blood-rushing riot.

ADIRONDACK BLACK MASS:
https://adirondackblackmass.bigcartel.com/
https://adirondackblackmass.bandcamp.com/album/absolute-dominion-by-fire-2

PYROMANCER:
https://www.facebook.com/PyromancerBlackDeath
https://pyromancer.bandcamp.com/