This one was quite a surprise, as I had seen it among the stores regularly-priced used CDs, and I wasn't expecting it to stick around long enough to get marked down. Original Razorback press too.
I was aware of the band for a while, but had never actually heard them before or even looked into them that much, so my only preconception was weird doom metal. The band name also obviously conjures up inaccurate stoner metal vibes, although I can see how it ultimately fits well with their concept. I wasn't expecting all the doom/death on here and had no idea there would be guttural vocals. I've since read some interviews and the band really seem to downplay the death metal element in the music as being little more than the vocals, but there is definitely a DM influence to some of the riffage that goes beyond just being the guitar tuning or vox.
Rather than being straightforward doom/death, the doom in the band's sound owes a lot to the doomier side of the NWOBHM. The lead guitar often pops up as tinny '70s sounding shredding, and is happily quite Pagan Altar-influenced at times.
There are also the sound effects which are responsible for the band's "psychedelic" descriptor. Aside from intros and interludes, there are occasional pulsating effects which do succeed in giving kind of a '70s/early '80s horror movie vibe despite being fairly minimal. Actually, before I ever heard the band but knew of their Halloween themes coupled with doom, I assumed there would be a much stronger Italian musical influence from say, Goblin, or Paul Chain. There's not at all. In a strange way, the effects sometimes remind me of when Sigh was starting to get super weird in the late '90s, although again, here it's far more restrained.
A few of the songs are very good, but often I think this has more of a unique/interesting vibe going for it than being truly great. I think the musical influences here are sometimes too disparate and don't mesh well in every song. I thought "Cauldron Cave" was one of the better tracks even though that has them leaning most heavily into traditional doom/death (at least after the intro stuff). I find the more upbeat riffage often holds the songs back from being really doomy and crushing, but on the other hand, the brutal vox and chunkiness aren't helpful in creating a mournful Pagan Altar sound. Then again, sometimes it totally works, as on "The Black Witch," which feels like Witchfinder General gone extreme.
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