German black/thrash/heavy metal trio Witching Hour return for your soul, eight long years since their last outburst ...and Silent Grief Shadows the Passing Moon. Alongside contemporaries like Nocturnal, Cruel Force, and Manzer, Witching Hour’s recent output has been well-received by critics and audiences alike. This puts the upcoming Decending… Where Time Has Ceased to Exist, Witching Hour’s fourth release in 20 years, in a prime position to compete well in its field. Will Descent… lead to greatness or will Witching Hour fumble the landing?

In some ways, they’ve threatened both. Witching Hour are an incredibly talented bunch, deftly straddling fences between black metal char, heavy metal righteousness, and thrash metal vitriol. Descending…’s warm and natural tones enhance these qualities, presenting a product that is easy on the ear while deadly to the spine. Songs build around long-form structures, with the shortest cut measuring over six minutes (not counting the fluffy instrumental intro), but overall runtime slots in at a tight 43 minutes. This makes repeat listens easy to approach. Sounds like everything is in place to secure a high score on the board, right?

Unfortunately, the songwriting lets Descending… down. Witching Hour’s latest epic suffers the same flaw as its predecessor: a lack of compositional dynamics and an overabundance of recycled parts. Each song taken out of the whole makes a compelling case. “Where Time Has Ceased to Exist” sets the bar quite high for the rest of the record, churning with a heavy metal swagger and roaring with spirit through epic leads, scorching tremolos, and thrashy switch-ups. Similarly, “Profane Resurrection of a Presumed Dead” hooks its claws into the brain with an insidious chorus bark and fiery guitar and percussion work. However, when unified as a whole, it’s all too easy to interchange phrases and measures between songs without fragmenting the experience. I can place my mark on two opposite sides—and stick a couple more pins in the center—and the same riffing motif, similar leads and flourishes, suspiciously familiar vocal runs, and the exact same bass-snare alternation greet me.

Doubly damning, epic 11-minute closer “…and Then Came the Flames” showcases all of these issues in a microcosm, establishing a concise summary of everything heard thus far. And just like the others, taken out of the album context, the song rocks. Reminiscent of the same kind of grand, hellish adventure that Bütcher so gloriously captures on 666 Goats Carry My Chariot, “…and Then Came the Flames” feels complete, exciting, and wild, at least at first. As the track progresses, recycled parts and pieces cheapen the experience until I’m desperate to jump off the boat as it reaches shore. This mirrors my experience with the album as a whole. Fun and entertaining in the initial throes, it becomes a slog to get through in remarkably short order. By the time the closer wraps up, I’ve heard multiple iterations of the same ideas, spliced and arranged to deceive me into believing, if only for a moment, that I could pick any of these songs (minus the opener proper) out of a lineup without a cheat sheet.

Confounding as it is, Witching Hour represents a clash between having great ideas and writing songs that don’t adequately support or develop them. Instead, Descending… drops their best work into a sea of repetitive structures and monotonous bloat in the hopes that observers might then discern and appreciate them. With at least a half dozen spins under my belt at the time of writing, I did indeed find worthy gems to take home—and when isolated from the collection, those gems really sparkle. However, those rewards don’t quite justify the expanse of fluff and drag that bog Descending… down. In another world where Witching Hour invoked a greater variety of techniques, tempos, and textures to fortify their compositions and bring reliability to excitement, this record would’ve been a barnburner. As it is, it never truly catches fire, and leaves me wanting.

Rating: Disappointing…
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Dying Victims Productions
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: May 22nd, 2026

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https://hellripper.bandcamp.com/track/the-hissing-marshes-2

#ThrashMetal #BlackThrash

UK antifascist blackened death/thrash trio Tyrannus caught my attention with the be-castled cover art for their upcoming sophomore record, Mournhold. Having never listened to them prior, I gravitated towards the promise of yet another robust hybrid of styles and sounds. With bands like Antiverse and Skeletonwitch to call on as points of comparison, Tyrannus all but guarantee my appreciation. This is the kind of genre-blending that I crave on an hourly basis. Does Mournhold have the goods to satisfy my voracious needs?

Lead single “Reignfall” demonstrates that Tyrannus aren’t fucking around, boasting an adrenaline-fueled cataclysm of riffs, shreds, pummels, and roars. It is an ideal case study for what Mournhold captures, ensaring the icy raze of black, the fiery vitriol of thrash, and the swaggering aggression of death in one fell swoop. Separated from those superficial attributes, it embodies the Platonic ideal of a great metal track. And so, Tyrannus publish their infernal formula, and Mournhold’s multifaceted application of that formula brews excitement and fun at every turn. Tightly packed into 40 minutes, seven tracks tear through a blunderbuss of cool ideas, hooky motifs, and fun deviations from the expected.

Most surprising of these diversions is center cut “Flesh Eternal,” which recalls the gothic swing of Tribulation if they took the ashen path to black/thrash. A really cool song on its own, “Flesh Eternal” more importantly cements Tyrannus as versatile songwriters and shrewd album composers. It resolves the aggressive black metal scorch of the first three songs—the best of which (“Orbus Non Suffict,” “Seizing Stars”) fulfill the gap left by Skeletonwitch after Serpents Unleashed. At the same time, it sets up the second act, beautifully bisecting Mournhold’s story with something a little more rock-oriented as a palette cleanser. That brief reprieve allows me to properly prepare myself for “Reignfall.” A barnburner of devilish nature, “Reignfall” Hellrips my face clean off with speed-metal riffs, righteous dive-bomb solos, and downright ignorant grooves charred by black metal rasps. A second twist that I hoped for but dared not expect, Mournhold’s back half transitions to altogether darker and moodier spaces than the front. “Slower” and longer form compositions (“Mournhold,” “Back to Grey”) reside in those spaces, creating an expanded stage for Tyrannus’ final ideas to land and settle.

This arrangement allows listeners to bask in more instrumental noodling and melodic storytelling as Mournhold comes to a close, but the risk of drag creeps in. “Mournhold” is certainly thrashy and aggressive enough in its second half to offset that inertia, but at six-and-a-half minutes, it rubs against bloat with a cocky smirk. Closer “Back to Grey” toys that line even more salaciously, teasing attention spans to their limit at nearly eight minutes. Luckily, its classic heavy metal gallop and olde-timey meloblack charm make it hard to hate. Like many tight runtimes, though, 40 minutes suffers more noticeably when any one song overstays its welcome; Mournhold’s final couplet gently cross that threshold. Cutting a minute from each—perhaps fewer repetitions of a riff here, and trimming an intro or bridge there—would make them stronger and thus improve the whole in kind.

Mournhold doesn’t need much improving, though, to be an unqualified success. It’s a rip-roaring fun time, with a youthful personality as exuberant as it is infectious. Tyrannus improved in every aspect on the promise of their debut, refining their voice into something highly recognizable and alluring. If this is just the beginning for Tyrannus, I tremble to think of what they might accomplish on future records. That’s a later Ken problem. For now, I’m content and gunning to storm castles and slay eldritch monsters for an eternity with Mournhold. Join me!

Rating: Great!
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: True Cult Records
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: May 15th, 2026

Heureka! Am 19.06.2026 erscheint „Past Midnight...“ von Witching Hour.

🔗 https://gloomr.de/#1649

#HeavyMetal #BlackThrash

Slay, slay them, profaner 🤘

https://bunker66.bandcamp.com/album/beyond-the-help-of-prayers

#ThrashMetal #BlackThrash

The new Hellripper album is great, but don't miss out on the new one from VOMIT DIVISION - at least not, if Hellripper are located at the clean, more polished edge of your listening spectrum. 😉

https://vomitdivision.bandcamp.com/album/hangover-highway

#ThrashMetal #BlackThrash

#ThrashMetal #BlackThrash
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2CFw1spXt8A

Free download codes:

Rancorous - Vultures Will Gather

"Raw, gritty, and abrasive blackened thrash that is sure to destroy... -Metal Trenches"

https://getmusic.fm/l/jBOQaJ

#metal #blackmetal #deathmetal #thrashmetal #extrememetal #deaththrash #blackthrash #music

Großartiger Abend. Der frühe Beginn geht samstags klar - so kommt man auch noch wieder weg, ohne in Hamm den Anschluss zu verlieren.
Die Trompete ist praktisch prädestiniert für solche Konzerte.

Midnight Prey, Witching Hour, Hellish Crossfire, Avalon
21.02.2026, Trompete, #Bochum
#HeavyMetal #BlackThrash #ThrashMetal #SpeedMetal #Konzert