Sunken – Lykke Review

By Twelve

I love Sunken’s music. It’s been over five years since I first heard their sophomore full-length, Livslede, an album I fell in love with almost instantly for its depressive, atmospheric black metal, an album of incredible emotion buoyed by exceptional songwriting. Since then, it’s been a regular revisit any time I’m having an even vaguely unhappy day, and I’ve been eagerly awaiting the day I could review these Danes again. At last that day is here. Sunken are back with their third full-length release, Lykke. They’re just in time too—the days are getting shorter, colder, and altogether darker, which means now is a great time to “sink” into a great slab of mournful black metal.

Sunken’s brand of black metal is—still—tricky to describe, but the principal thing to point out about it is that it is deeply mournful. It’s unmistakably black metal, as Joachim Larsen’s blast beats quickly demonstrate. Guitarists Simon Krogh and Alexander Salling seemingly live for the tremolo, both in blackened riffs and melodic leads. But those leads are drenched in despair—”Og Det Er Lykke” is downright depressive, with a heavy backdrop of riffs counterbalanced by a measured lead that oozes melancholy. The song’s climax is an overflow of heartbreaking turmoil, written and performed expertly. There are times, as in opener “Din Roest Malede Farver I Luften,” when Jonas Faghtmann’s bass is carrying the low end by itself, so occupied are the other instruments with higher, more woeful melodies. Put together, and you get Lykke, an album that is powerfully cathartic, with every element working together to share impassioned anger, sorrow, and despair.

In my review for Livslede, I noted that the experience made me feel physically cold, so strong was Sunken’s affinity for baleful, depressive black metal. Lykke doesn’t have quite the same quality, but it does expertly capture a feeling of grief1—raw and powerful, but also comparatively softer than its predecessor. The stronger use of keys contributes heavily here, as songs like “Glaedesfaerd” demonstrate. Here, they cast a solemn sheen that blankets the heavy, blackened frenzies Sunken have crafted beneath. When Martin Thomasen’s vocal style shifts from shrieks to grieving howls, the music feels unhinged, desolate—but it’s those keys, those orchestral arrangements from Max Uldahl Pedersen, that ground it in the tragic, sorrowful sound Sunken performs so well.

In a practical sense, these trends away from Livslede also mean that Lykke is closer to being atmospheric black metal than depressive black metal. That no song is shorter than ten minutes—and that there are only four of them—makes Lykke feel drawn out, as though lingering in its own despair. Add to that the more prominent orchestrations, and it feels both more melodic and less than Sunken have been in the past. It feels more melodic, because the keys and lead guitars are produced in a way to make them prominent in their melancholy, and less because these choices emphasize individual melodies and hooks less. It feels as though Sunken focused this time on creating experiences over particularly memorable songs and passages. I don’t think there are any specific standout moments, but that does not make the songwriting any less impressive, nor the performances less impactful, though it does make Lykke feel just a little unfocused. Similarly, I also find Thomasen’s forays into raw howled vocals don’t work with this more atmospheric music as well as his “regular” style of snarling, shrieking, and snarling. The switches feel arbitrary, and the former style less effective.

Sunken have an extraordinary way of capturing sadness in their music. Make no mistake, Lykke is a powerful album. There are some choices that I’m not fully sold on, but that’s largely my holding Sunken in such high regard. I’ve really enjoyed Lykke, and am impressed by Sunken’s songwriting, talent, and ability to convey, purely by their music, the way I feel when everything is just sort of bleak.

Rating: 3.5/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 192 kbps mp3
Label: Eisenwald Records
Websites: sunkendenmark.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/SunkenDenmark
Releases Worldwide: October 24th, 2025

#2025 #35 #AtmosphericBlackMetal #DanishMetal #EisenwaldRecords #Lykke #Oct25 #Review #Reviews #Sunken

Ellereve – Umbra Review

By Thus Spoke

In a world where “not metal” is used to deride artists as much as it is to make a factual statement about them, it’s funny how the metalsphere adopts a breadth of musical styles that borrow ‘key’ elements to various minimal degrees. Usually, they end up being grouped under post-metal. So it is that Ellereve lands in the sight of Angry Metal Guy—and more specifically, me. Their sonic palette, which has so far been defined by a largely acoustic, folk-leaning rock, now steps more confidently into post-metal and even post-black, though Elisa Giulia Teschner’s sweet, husky cleans remain the star around which everything orbits. Ellereve’s pivot to a slightly heavier sound is deliberate, reflecting the album’s confrontation of grief and trauma, but maintaining the same distinctive voice (literally and generally).

Like its namesake, Umbra is dark, but in a soft, dreamlike way. The reverberant atmosphere slips between airy weightlessness and dense gravity, as stripped-back liquid plucks and keys trade places with downtuned riffs, and Elisa’s singing also slips between ethereal and ardent. Her voice—along with the music’s overall vibe—recalls some mixture of Darkher, Halsey, and Draconian’s Heike Langhans, and against the smoky backdrop, adds to the music’s shadowy mystique. Sometimes creeping along with shuddering gravity (“An Avalanche of Shudders,” “Crawl”) or weightlessly (“Swallowed & Disguised”), sometimes bursting forth with spirited post-black or post hardcore energy (“Irreversible,” “The Veil of Your Death”), the album ebbs and flows to the fading and resurgence of cymbals, the final breaths of a vocal line, and the gentle crescendo of synth. While traversing several moods in this manner, Ellereve’s heart stays front and centre, making every resonant strum and note, and every switch up into heavier riffs and faster drums ring with honest emotion.

Umbra is an album of opposites, again embodying the metaphor of the shadow that exists only because of the light. Through this, the music possesses a staying power that’s subtle but powerful. The melodies are melancholic and yet often hopeful, as the notes lift an octave, and ambience, or an uptempo, seeps in. This is a synecdoche for the album’s theme, which surrounds the darkness of loss and trauma, but looks to the light on the other side of the pain. Many songs begin with the stillness of hanging plucks, distorted synth, or stripped-back lamenting, but end with uplifting refrains or assertive heaviness—relative to what came prior (“Funeral,” “Irreversible,” “Trauma”). Other songs showcase the duality in a more blended form. This could be through energetic tempos and brighter chords that transmit strength belying their lyrical solemnity (“Like a moth to a flame,” “The veil of your death”),1 or through the severe pathos of mournful tremolo and hanging plucks as the emotive singing delivers lyrics of finding strength and purpose (“Unravel,”2 “Trauma”). Some songs are even palpably onomatopoeic with quavering chords (“An avalanche of shudders”), strange, creeping synth-percussion patterns (“Crawl”), or heartbreakingly sad gaze (“Lost in Longings”) aptly embodying their title. Things thus feel dynamic but not scattershot, expressive but not overwrought.

I didn’t realize it, but Ellereve is exactly what I needed to hear. Their particular sound, blurring of elements from doom to post to gaze and more, while not totally novel, is magnetic in its distinctiveness. I feel like I know who Ellereve is, because their music communicates it so well. This is only helped by a strong production that emphasises the space created through any reverb, and centres the vocals without burying the instruments. That said, Umbra is hindered ever so slightly by Ellereve’s ambition, covering a lot of ground and in quite rapid succession, as songs all span three to five minutes. Honing in a little tighter, potentially by expanding material into longer tracks, is all it would take to reach greatness.

With Umbra, Ellereve step confidently out of the shadows. As a first transition into post-metal proper, it’s impressively well-crafted and is compelling in its own right. Both deeply emotional and easy to listen to repeatedly, it signals potential for brilliance in the artist’s future.3

Rating: Very Good!
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Eisenwald(EU/ROW) | Eisenwald (US)
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: November 7th, 2025

#2025 #35 #Darkher #Doom #DoomMetal #EisenwaldRecords #Ellereve #Folk #HarakiriForTheSky #Nov25 #PostMetal #Review #Reviews #Shoegaze #Umbra

Eisenwald hat mal wieder geliefert...

#vinyl
#EisenwaldRecords

Arkhaaik – Uihtis Review

By Twelve

Arkhaaik is a fascinating band. Usually, when a metal project endeavors to write a historically-accurate deep dive into ages gone by, they make some kind of power metal, and the ages are Middle. Maybe the ages are pre-1,000s, and they make black metal. But rarely—if ever—is the age Bronze, but I guess when the topic is the Bronze age, the band is blackened, death-y, sludge-y annihilation, and their name is Arkhaaik. Today’s topic is Uihtis (“the hunt”), which represents these Swedes’ second foray into this deep, deep history. Previously reviewed here by Carcharodon, it’s been five years since *dʰg̑ʰm̥tós, their debut full-length release. That’s a drop in the bucket as far as their historic subject matter goes, but plenty of time for a sound to evolve. Have Arkhaaik discovered iron on Uihtis?

As with *dʰg̑ʰm̥tós, Uihtis is inspired by history that is beyond ancient. It is written in a reconstructed approximation of Proto-Indo European, the presumed language from which most European languages are descended. Uihtis explores the world of Bronze Age hunting from physical and spiritual lenses, and tries to capture the prehistoric experience through the reconstructed language, brutal riffing and melodies, and an intense blend of death and atmospheric metal. Everything from the guitars to the drums to the vocals is huge. No song is shorter than ten minutes, and elements of ritualistic melody are similarly big—dominating, guttural chanting, hypnotic drumming, and nature samples, twisted into something stranger. Arkhaaik don’t mind that you have no frame of reference for their inspiration. The music does all the talking for them.

In his review of *dʰg̑ʰm̥tós, Carcharodon noted that “this debut feels unfocused and as though Arkhaaik have not yet figured out how to properly meld their ritual cult stuff with the more metal elements;” Uihtis shows they are getting closer. Unlike *dʰg̑ʰm̥tós, there are very few extended passages of ambience or ritualism. Instead, the music itself is adorned with the aforementioned rhythmic chants and ritualistic melody. This is, as I mentioned, a great thing for Uihtis’s concept, but it also means that the music itself is melodic and fun to follow. Alien though the subject matter may be (at least to me, who is not in any way, shape, or form a hunter), the melodeath-like riffs of “Geutores Suhnos” are easy to understand, because they’re awesome. The vocals in particular are mighty—”Hrkþos Heshr Hiagom” muscles its way into your skull with dominant, death metal riffing, but it’s the primal roars that really dominate. As Uihtis barrels along, the blend of ritual, riff, and roar blends together to create a remarkable union of an album, one where the songs, concepts, and passages feel like they’re contributing to one grand idea of an album.

On the other hand, it can be less than ideal for each song on an album to feel like it’s blended with its neighbors. Uihtis is comprised of four songs and clocks in at just under fifty minutes. I’m not opposed to long songs on principle, but I do feel like Uihtis could have been shorter than it is. “Geutores Sunhos,” for example, is my favorite on the album. It’s huge, it’s riff-tastic, and expertly blends Arkhaaik’s heavy, melodic, and ritualistic ideas. Midway through the song, there’s a furious blackened interlude that builds up to the final chorus, a huge, ominous barrage of riffs, chants, and melody. When that chorus winds down, ten minutes in, it feels like the song should too, but there are still a full five minutes to go, and I can never honestly recall them after the song ends. This feels like a repeated theme through Uihtis, where each song has a unique and exciting main idea, but is prone to wandering for a few minutes here and there.

Arkhaaik have taken what seems to be a unique idea and really made it their own on Uihtis. Their blend of melody, heaviness, and (pre-)historic inspiration makes them extremely compelling. While I do think Uihtis contains a little too much here and there, it all culminates into a fascinating journey, one I think is well worth experiencing. Arkhaaik has an affinity for storytelling, and the atmosphere is truly fun to experience, and their music is all the better for it.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Eisenwald Records
Website: arkhaaik.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: July 25th, 2025

#2025 #30 #Arkhaaik #DeathMetal #DoomMetal #EisenwaldRecords #Jul25 #Review #Reviews #Sludge #SwedishMetal #Uihtis

Panzerfaust – The Suns of Perdition – Chapter IV: To Shadow Zion Review

By Carcharodon

The Panzerfaust tetralogy, The Suns of Perdition series, began all the way back in 2019 with Chapter I: War, Horrid War. Despite being a great record, delivered by a band showing huge promise, this massive saga wasn’t one that I really expected to ever see finished. Bands break up, get dragged into controversies1 or whatever. But, five years later, here we are, at the conclusion of The Suns of Perdition series and the end of the world. For that is what Chapter IV: To Shadow Zion explores: the world slowly falling apart, as human society and civilization approach inevitable collapse, and descends into chaos. At my hands, the series to date has gone 4.02-4.5-3.5. Does the final entry represent a triumphant conclusion to an epic saga or Panzerfaust’s unavoidable descent into the reality of the cold light of day?

To say that Panzerfaust’s music is misanthropic would be an understatement. The entire thesis of The Suns of Perdition is that to put it bluntly, humanity is a collection of twats doing awful things, which will eventually lead to the apocalypse. Even measured against that yardstick, Chapter IV: To Shadow Zion is bleak. And unrelenting. Unrelentingly bleak, one could say. Gone are the shimmering adornments and twisted, yet familiar, touchpoints scattered across War, Horrid War. Gone are the dancing melodies that occasionally lifted the gloom brooding over of Chapter II: Render unto Eden. Gone (thankfully!) are the interludes that disrupted the threat of Chapter III: The Astral Drain. Panzerfaust is unleashed on To Shadow Zion, with nothing held back. From start to finish, this is the sound of The End. However, where a band like LLNN rendered the apocalypse real on Unmaker through sheer heaviness measured in metric tonnage, Panzerfaust achieves the same by tone alone. Don’t get me wrong, To Shadow Zion is crushing, with savage carnage on the likes of “When Even the Ground is Hostile,” as Goliath’s sulphuric, rasping roar rips out over the backing vocals and cascading tremolos of Brock van Dijk. But from the doom-laden overtones that open “Occam’s Fucking Razor,” with its half-heard, half-chanted backing vocals to the brutal but stripped-back closing third of “The Hesychasm Unchained,” Panzerfaust achieve a cohesive tone of desolation through a variety of means.

As on previous outings in The Suns of Perdition saga, so on To Shadow Zion, Panzerfaust’s true MVP is drummer Alexander Kartashov. His ability, and crucially willingness, to shift between metronomic, artillery-like blasts, doom-laden rhythmic patterns, and something altogether more progressive is what both holds Panzerfaust’s compositions together and drives them forward. Most evident on album highlight, “The Damascene Conversions,” Kartashov modulates his patterns to perfectly accentuate and highlight the bağlama3 (contributed by guest Ahmet lhvani). Far from introducing a lift in mood, the bağlama’s discordant, twanging harmonies bring a sense of mournful hopelessness. The epic closer, “To Shadow Zion (No Sanctuary),” is massive, its rolling guitar lines and thick, meaty bass steamrollering forward, as Goliath switches up his delivery in places, leaning into a snarling, half-spoken rasp that conveys nothing but contempt for his subject: us.

“Fuck hope” intones Goliath (or possibly van Dijk) toward the back end of “When Even the Ground is Hostile,” capturing the entire feel of To Shadow Zion. Panzerfaust has created a dark portrait of a world in flames and done so in five, tightly written tracks, spanning just 45 minutes. The Astral Drain devoted ten full minutes of its run to meandering interludes. These are abandoned entirely here, which means that despite being two minutes shorter than its predecessor, To Shadow Zion delivers more actual music and does so cohesively, without sacrificing its flow or tracks transitions. The production is good, without being stellar. A lot of emphasis is placed on the (excellent) drums and (trademark) vocals, but I do wish Van Dijk’s guitars were pushed just a little more into the foreground in the heavier passages. That said, the guitar tone in melodic places, like the melancholic opening to “The Damascene Conversions,” is perfect and the overall soundstage is dynamic.

The slight (and relative) drop in quality on last installment, Chapter III: The Astral Drain, notwithstanding, delivering a worthy conclusion to The Suns of Perdition saga was always going to be a huge challenge for Panzerfaust. On To Shadow Zion, they have risen to the occasion. “The Damascene Conversions” is likely to follow “The Far Bank at the River Styx” in finding a high place on my SOTY list, while the album as a whole delivers on everything that Panzerfaust set out to achieve. Whilst not quite reaching the stellar heights of series-highlight Chapter II: Render unto Eden, Chapter IV: To Shadow Zion has a devastating flow to it and it’s more than worthy of closing this epic saga.

Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Eisenwald Records
Websites: panzerfaust.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/PANZERFAUST.BM.OFFICIAL
Releases Worldwide: November 22nd, 2024

#2024 #40 #AtmosphericBlackMetal #BlackMetal #CanadianMetal #EisenwaldRecords #LLNN #Nov24 #Panzerfaust #Review #Reviews #TheSunsOfPerditionChapterIVToShadowZion

They Came from Visions – The Twilight Robes Review

By Doom_et_Al

I’ve always found the notion of “folk horror” to be altogether more ominous and scarier than psychopaths stalking teenagers. Rural settings, pagan beliefs, blood sacrifices, normal people committing terrible acts in the name of terrifying superstition … this is all deeply compelling stuff. They Came from Visions, an anonymous Ukrainian black metal outfit, clearly agrees. Sophomore album, The Twilight Robes, is positively steeped in folk horror, positioning each of its songs as a vignette, explaining the arrival of mysterious strangers called – you guessed it! – The Twilight Robes – who visit horror and despair upon an unsuspecting world, causing them to act in violent and depraved ways. This simple, yet compelling, theme is emphasized by the gorgeous, uncluttered album art. The fact that this comes from Ukraine, a country currently at war, only heightens the allegory. So far, so good. But does the music match the lofty aims of the band’s themes?

Mostly! They Came from Visions are, first and foremost, a black metal band, with one foot in the atmospheric camp and another in the melodic. There are rasped, wretched vocals, a raw production, and instrumentation with a distinctly medieval flavor to it. When it comes together, there is an indelible sense of atmosphere and foreboding, reminding me of European contemporaries Vehemence, albeit a lot less polished. The songs are surprisingly melodic, often building around central riffs that may not be earworms, per se, but are definitely on the catchier side. Check the central melodies of “Equinox Ablaze” or “Burning Eyes Blackened Claws.” The downside is that, like too many bands these days, the songs occasionally go on too long, draining them of some of their punch.

What really holds The Twilight Robes together so well is how beautifully the concept and the music are melded. The stories are horrifying – in the aforementioned “Equinox Ablaze,” for example, we hear about a village that burns its own citizens alive to appease the Harvest Gods. Yes, this is very Wicker Man-esque, but the band treat the subject matter with solemnity and seriousness, making it far more like the Christopher Lee version than the Nicolas Cage one. The harshness of the music combines with the subject matter like peanut butter and chocolate, resulting in an album that stays thematically consistent throughout its runtime. It does feel like we are witnessing a world slowly being consumed by superstitious darkness. Considering the meager resources available to the band while recording, this is a fantastic achievement.

About that production, though. It really does the music no favors whatsoever. The drums are far too soft, which is a problem when your music is mid-paced and melodic. Instead of thumping rhythm we get anemic pats, which leaches the music of some of its power. The vocals are too prominent, and with little variety in the rasps, quickly become overpowering and somewhat headache-inducing. A few times, I had to stop the album despite enjoying the songs, because my ears were hurting. Maybe I’m just getting olde, but more likely The Twilight Robes needed some more tinkering in the mixing studio. This is all unfortunate because the production missteps draw the listener out of the experience, rather than immersing them in it.

Despite these issues, the good on The Twilight Robes outweighs the bad. The songs are compelling and thematically cohesive. The tone is pitch-perfect and moody, while capturing that unmistakable folk horror aesthetic. With some tighter editing and some tinkering in the production studio, we could have had something truly special. As it is, this is a flawed, yet highly entertaining addition to the “rural” black metal genre.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 9 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Eisenwald Records
Websites: theycamefromvisions.bandcamp.com/ | facebook.com/theycamefromvisions/
Released Worldwide: February 23rd, 2024

#2024 #30 #BlackMetal #EisenwaldRecords #Feb24 #FolkMetal #Review #Reviews #TheyCameFromVisions #UkrainianMetal #Vehemence