Style: experimental black metal, psychedelic black metal, dissonant black metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Oranssi Pazuzu, Blut Aus Nord, Ulcerate
Country: United Kingdom
Release date: 1 August 2025

A couple of my non-metal friends asked me the difference between black metal and death metal at dinner the other day, and I struggled to come up with a sufficient answer before finally deciding on “black metal focuses on atmosphere; death metal on bludgeoning.” It’s a drastic oversimplification, but how else would you describe the minutiae of extreme metal subgenres to people who would hear both as offensive noise? I was relatively proud of my off-the-cuff answer. British psychedelic black metal band Sea Mosquito certainly fit my miniature description of black metal as a wave of guitar, synth, and drums washes over the listener for forty-four minutes on Majestas. The record can be oppressively nightmarish, but without many distinct riffs, the atmosphere the group conjures is key to their success. 

The guitar parts function in the same manner as the synths—a background for the drums and rare lead guitars. From the swirly album opener “Organs Dissolved in Lacquer” to the dissonant closer “To Look upon Your Own Skeleton,” you are baptized in tremolo picking, awash in ambient synths. Occasionally, Sea Mosquito blesses the listener with a cleaner guitar tone, providing a lead above the murk like on “In Reverence of Pain.” Those moments with something more concrete to grab onto are godsends amidst the dark, hellish undercurrent. Beyond the guitars, the drums on Majestas are strong and dynamic. The drummer transitions between nice blast beats like on “In Reverence of Pain” to being the center focus like at 3:00 in “Organs Dissolved in Lacquer,” where he does monstrous cascading lines as if he provides the riff. While the rest of the band waffles about on their instruments, he carries Sea Mosquito’s inertia and rhythm—without him, Majestas has no movement.

Weirdly, Sea Mosquito leave the vocals drowning in the shadows while the acerbic highs would do well to create some clearer tension in their sound. When the vocals take center stage—the spoken harshes heralding the climax of “Ascension” and the spoken Arabic in the ghazal in “Ode to Wine” notably—are the moments when Majestas reaches its full potential. The lyrics, while difficult to parse except when vocalist Nuun switches into a more spoken register, are always interesting, contributing excellently to the cult-like atmosphere. My favorite track, “Ascension,” is elevated by its critique of postmodernism, with a crystal-clear uttering of “you will never feel the power of the sublime” leading into a bright, expansive, yet oppressive wall of sound as a climax. Many of the lyrics are inspired by Romanian religious scholar Mircea Eliade, and the literary slant is one of the album’s strongest assets in terms of atmosphere-crafting. 

But despite the many atmospheric strengths of Majestas, the emphasis on that aspect of their sound is the record’s downfall. Hardly a memorable moment is to be found in most of the tracks on the record, as it becomes an amorphous slog, more focused on textural style than songwriting substance. The album is nightmarish, psychedelic, and literary, yet the lack of sharp songwriting and forgettable riffs, while also mixing the vocals too low, is too much to overlook, leaving Sea Mosquito to be just another dissoblack album to add to the pile.

Recommended tracks: Ascension, In Reverence of Pain, Ode to Wine
You may also like: Decline of the I, The Great Old Ones, Haar, Omega Infinity, Noise Trail Immersion
Final verdict: 6/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Facebook | Instagram | Metal-Archives

Label: I, Voidhanger Records – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Sea Mosquito is:
– Nuun – Voice
– Fas – Spirit
– Akmonas – Soma

The post Review: Sea Mosquito – Majestas appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: experimental black metal, dissonant black metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Infant Annihilator, Frontierer
Country: ?
Release date: 25 January 2025

This is it, everybody: my last review. It was fun while it lasted, but as soon as Sam reads this I will be fired¹. He started this blog to review, like, power/prog and crap, and here I am covering stuff from a goregrind label. Not only that, but I need to get into the nitty gritty of some unsavory theology. With that said, I’m sorry, Sam, for taking over the rudder of this ship and steering us aground into an area of extreme metal I know you’d rather believe does not exist.

My peers made enough fun of me for my “car alarm metal” Scarcity last year, so I dread to think what they’ll have to say about Christian Necromancy’s microtonal, off-time ten-stringed lyre fed through enough distortion and amplification to be able to pick scrape (“The Leistae”). What you can hear of the lyre over the obnoxiously loud drums switches channels at slanted times in shrieking disagreement. Not once do the channels sync up, nor do the drums relent their hailstorm: this is thirty-four minutes in the meat-grinder—you’d better be comfy with noisy dissonance. On Bandcamp, Christian Necromancy also asserts that there is a fretless bass on The Pederast, but it’s wholly lost in the mix. But despite being completely obnoxious, out of time, and out of tune, The Pederast is occasionally compelling musically to me for reasons I don’t quite understand myself. Perhaps I am a masochist or maybe I like seeing how far metal can be pushed—I mean, the idea of a distorted ten-stringed lyre is cool. Sam would tell me I’ve simply lost the plot, that my mind is too far gone. I think The Pederast is musical pornography, obscene but strangely addictive².

Christian Necromancy are (wanna-be) theologists, however, and the music is merely an oracle for them to spread their gospel. With in-depth analysis of Greek source texts including medical journals, the Septuagint, and other documents, The Pederast’s lyrics tell a classic tale in metal… sex abuse of minors in the Church… wait, what? Christian Necromancy and their scripture are alleging that Jesus Christ himself was a pederast with what they say is pure historical fact. The lyrics are upsetting, but even with claims that they use direct sources, they read as pure conspiracy theory—I say that as someone who dislikes religion. For instance, Christian Necromancy are certain that Mark 14:51-52³ are the only two verses you need to destroy the faith, but they’re just not very damning, even less so in the original Greek context from my research (I am no theological slouch, believe it or not).

The Pederast does have some undeniably banger lyrics, at least. For instance, “BEHOLD THE PENIS CHRIST” goes unreasonably hard. But actual thesis claims are harder to believe, especially since I cannot find a single primary source OR secondary source about them. I cannot find information that mystery cults venerated Christ precisely because he was proficient at trafficking child slaves (“The Leistae”). Similarly, the entire premise of “Ejaculated Antichrist” revolves around sexual drug rituals that I just cannot find any proof of existing. Similarly, who else besides Christian Necromancy has forwarded the claim that JC holds up two fingers in Christian iconography as a way to symbolize that he was ready to insert drugs into the anuses of children? Please feel free to send over your sources, Christian Necromancy, but The Pederast reads as conspiracy, grasping at straws. 

By reviewing The Pederast as I am, I’m putting myself in serious danger since Christian Necromancy claim on Bandcamp: “LET ANYONE INTERFERING WITH THE TRANSMISSION OF THIS INFORMATION BE PUNISHABLE BY A VIOLENT DEATH.” Wait, I’m undeniably aiding in transmission if anything. But it has to be said… if Christian Necromancy’s message is so urgent, why release it in such an abstruse style of black metal. Shouldn’t they perform something a bit more, y’know, marketable to spread their philosophy? I understand this is a more authentic artistic vision, but they are the ones interfering with the transmission of their information by making it impossible to listen to. 

I attempted to engage with both the music and philosophy of Christian Necromancy, and both are equally over-the-top absurd. The Pederast is a comical album despite the horrifying nature of its lyrics. Something drew me to it initially, though, and I’m intrigued by how the project will develop. With my score for this, maybe I’m safe from being fired since at least the blog will keep its prog credibility. Phew.

Recommended tracks: Let the Children Come
You may also like: Effluence, Theophonos, Jute Gyte, Scarcity, Botanist, Ὁπλίτης
Final verdict: 3/10

Related links: Bandcamp

Label: Putrefactive Recordings – Bandcamp | Official Website

Christian Necromancy is:
– ?

1.  Or worse, my mom will read it on the blog and I’ll be excommunicated from my own family. ︎
2. Ummm please ignore that diction once you get into the next couple paragraphs… ︎
3.  “A certain young man was following him, wearing nothing but a linen cloth. They caught hold of him, but he left the linen cloth and ran off naked.” ︎

The post Review: Christian Necromancy – The Pederast appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Painting by: Asthâghul; Visual design by: Francesco Gemelli

Style: Experimental black/death metal, folk (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: The Ruins of Beverast, Oranssi Pazuzu, Blut Aus Nord, Leviathan (the Wrest one)
Country: France
Release date: 20 September 2024

Asthâghul is one of metal’s most mystifying presences. Solo project Esoctrilihum is written entirely in a self-made up language and its lyrics (allegedly) speak of the occult. The person/entity/musical force with a shadowy lore is extremely prolific, too, releasing up to two albums a year chock full of dense arrangements across the experimental black/death metal spectrum. Four years ago, the hype for Eternity of Shaog also reached my corner of the internet, and I was enthralled by its suffocating, yet mystifying atmosphere and emotionally potent use of violin. I cannot say I’ve kept up with all their releases, but I was happy to tackle the newest release, Döth-Dernyàlh.

To get the biggest hurdle out of the way first, let’s talk about length. Asthâghul has seldom been one to keep their records short, and at a chunky eighty minutes, Döth-Dernyàlh is no exception. Compared to earlier releases, however, Döth-Dernyàlh is far less oppressive as melodic elements are pushed to the forefront of the mix and its extreme metal aspects largely reside in the background. Its cavernous, reverb-laden mix is light on the ear, as if you heard the band playing from a distant chamber instead of witnessing it from up close. For those reasons, Döth-Dernyàlh is not at all fatiguing to listen to despite its length—from a sonic perspective at least.

None of this means that Döth-Dernyàlh is in any way gentle. Asthâghul’s tortured screams echo through layers of reverb while spooky 90s black metal synths fill the air as faint tremolo riffs, pulsating blast beats, and double pedal work remind us that this is indeed a metal record. What makes Döth-Dernyàlh so captivating, though, is how Asthâghul develops the atmosphere around a consistent rhythmic motive, creating immersive sections in which a variety of instruments play around a pulsating rhythm that last for minutes before moving onto the next idea. Traditional songcraft is largely eschewed for stream of consciousness compositions that take the listener on a trip through the astral plane where emotions flow in and out of existence at seemingly random levels of intensity. 

The most interesting addition to Esoctrilihum’s sound this time around lies in the exploration of psychedelia and folk music. Acoustic guitar frequently takes the lead, providing melody and color to balance out the abrasive aspects in a manner ranging from straightforward campfire folk a la Falkenbach to Kaatayra-esque sections where acoustics dance over otherwise extreme metal instrumentation. A general pagan aesthetic is also achieved through a constant pulse of dreamy, somewhat ominous synths interwoven by melancholic melodies from the nyckelharpa, and frequent chants from Asthâghul. Even in the album’s most cavernous, abrasive moments, the resulting soundscape is enthrallingly magical. 

Normally, this is where I’d enter my criticism paragraph, but there’s nothing I can really point to that goes wrong on Döth-Dernyàlh. It’s the kind of record that you put on while working and then lose track of time as you enter a flow state until eventually it peters out of existence but it still lingers on in your mind for a few minutes after it’s done as you come to realize that you barely remember anything that happened except for the vague sensation that it was a pleasant experience. I guess if anything, I’m missing standout moments. The album isn’t completely formless—the tracks do all come with their own identity—but there is a homogeneity to the sound that prevents individual moments from shining through, and I’m lacking some of the emotional catharsis that Asthaghul did manage to achieve on earlier albums.

Overall though, I enjoyed Döth-Dernyalh. While it lacks stand-out moments, the atmosphere is thoroughly compelling, and the fact that its eighty minute runtime flew by like it did is a testament to that. Do not look here for a conventional experience; this is a journey through the dreams of a mad musical entity that is as fascinating as it is strange, and a fitting addition to Asthaghul’s mystifying catalog.

Recommended tracks: Atüs Liberüs, Murzaithas
You may also like: Kaatayra, Bekor Qilish, Vauruvã
Final verdict: 7/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Metal-Archives page

Label: I, Voidhanger – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Esoctrilihum is:
– Asthâghul (everything)

The post Review: Esoctrilihum – Döth-Dernyàlh appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: dissonant death metal, experimental black metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Gorguts, Deathspell Omega, Immolation
Review by: Andy
Country: Italy
Release date: 20 October, 2023

My ears perk up like a dog that knows one trick when I hear the word “sublime,” and I start salivating knowing that I’m in for a treat. My whole book on the theory behind metal (in progress) is centered around metal’s quest for dark sublimity. Titling your album A Dialogue with the Eeriest Sublime is a cheat code to get an Andy review, though I can’t promise I’ll be nice if I don’t think it’s as awe-inspiring and terrifying as I expect. Do Italy’s Vertebra Atlantis achieve dark sublimity on their sophomore album?

Their first album, Lustral Purge in Cerulean Bliss, was released only two years ago and contained many unwieldy, devilish twists, a dissonant release overshadowed by Ad Nauseam’s iconic Imperative Imperceptible Impulse but of astoundingly high quality itself. The follow-up, however, begins to move away from the Ad Nauseam-isms, the hard shell of dissonance cracking open to reveal, dare I say, a delicate melodicism. In this regard, the orchestrated synth background does a lot of the heavy lifting, changing the atmosphere from quagmire to epic battle-scene. Parts of the bulky album centerpiece “Desperately Ablaze, from the Lowest Lair” even sound like a dissodeath version of Summoning, transporting me straight to the battles of Middle Earth with the ethereal flute and majestic orchestral swells.

Credited with orchestration on metallum, G.G. (of Cosmic Putrefaction) produces some solid soundscapes for Vertebra Atlantis, but while epic and melodic, they sometimes feel a bit cheesy when compared to the real deal of Ad Nauseam’s strings: the danger is gone here, the stakes are lower. Moreover, the production occasionally falls into some cavernous death metal tropes–mostly a low-end reverb–that I don’t think are befitting of such a style of dissodeath since it demands clarity, not squelching wetness. However, G.G.’s guitar solos fit the mix excellently as well as contributing to that sense of melody seeping into the foundation of Vertebra Atlantis’s sound, so it’s really just the riff-heavy sections that feel a bit misguided in the production. Thankfully, the bass is prominent in the mix, and it even takes the lead in several highlight sections like on opener, “Into Cerulean Blood I Bathe.” 

Vertebra Atlantis certainly find themselves in A Dialogue with the Eeriest Sublime at points. The harmonic solos on “Frostpalace Gloaming Respite” are gloriously beautiful and really feel as if the band is finding their own identity in the dissonant-metal sphere with their unexpected beauty. The title track, for instance, could not have been predicted by anybody with its heartfelt clean singing and stellar post rock crescendoing. Finally, as mentioned before, the highlight of A Dialogue with the Eeriest Sublime simply has to be “Desperately Ablaze, from the Lowest Lair.” From the choral synths to the rocking flutes to the underlying skronky dissonance, the track is a sprawling prog epic, simultaneously focused and explorative. Near the end, it even takes a violent twist into black metal that I almost wish other tracks would take, especially “In Starlike Ancient Eyes” which moves at a Worm-crawl out of place compared to the rest of the tracks’ more straight death metal pace. 

I applaud Vertebra Atlantis for radically changing a lot of their identity here, but there are still kinks the band needs to work out before writing a truly sublime masterpiece. The questioning and restlessness that comes across clearly throughout A Dialogue with the Eeriest Sublime bodes well for a future project, though, and in the meantime this has certainly got its moments of awe-inspiring bombast.

Recommended tracks: Frostpalace Gloaming Respite, “Desperately Ablaze, from the Lowest Lair,” A Dialogue with the Eeriest Sublime
You may also like: Ad Nauseam, Ulcerate, Heaving Earth, Baring Teeth, Cosmic Putrefaction, Aeviterne, Abyssal, Suffering Hour, Ars Magna Umbrae, Replicant, Zhrine, Haar, Qrixkuor
Final verdict: 7.5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page

Label: I, Voidhanger – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Vertebra Atlantis is:
– R.R. (vocals, drums)
– G.S. (guitars (rhythm))
– G.G. (guitars, vocals, keyboards, bass)

The post Review: Vertebra Atlantis – A Dialogue with the Eeriest Sublime appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: Progressive/Atmospheric Black Metal (mixed, French vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Thy Catafalque, Arkona (Russian one), Midnight Odyssey
Review by: Sam
Country: France
Release date: 4 August, 2023

“Bedroom black metal musician” is one of metal’s most prominent stereotypes, and for good reason. Chances are big that for nearly every week of the past twenty years, you will find multiple releases by solo black metal projects. Often these are completely unremarkable, being either generic second wave worship or unlistenable experimental garbage. However, with quantity eventually comes quality, so even if their relative percentage is low, there is a surprising total amount of killer experimental black metal solo projects. Ars Moriendi – led by “Arsonist” – is one of those.

This project has been around for a long time. According to Metal-Archives, “Arsonist” started lighting his bedroom on fire in 2001, and has been adding fuel ever since. It took a while before the flames would make their imprint on an actual CD, debuting in 2008 after a slew of toasted demo tapes, but his environmental pollution has been steady ever since. In the past four years he’s ramped up the process, no longer just igniting his latest IKEA purchases but dumping gasoline on them as well, yielding explosive output. Lorsque les coeurs s’assèchent is the latest charred delicacy to come out of his bedroom, and I’m here to tell you whether or not it has the right seasoning.

Like much of black metal, the writing focus here lies more on flow and atmosphere than on recurring themes and motifs. If done well, this style of writing can take you on transformative adventures through bewildering sonic landscapes. When done poorly, it becomes aimless meandering with no real highlights to speak of that etch themselves into your memory. Ars Moriendi sit somewhere in the middle of that spectrum. Arsonist likes spicing up his base melodic/atmospheric black metal sound with influences from electronic music, from the dungeon synth on “Quand tout (…)” to the trance and industrial effects of “Nous sommes passés”, to the spacy percussion sounds on “Le blasphémateur”. These various influences give the record a lot of personality.

Lorsque les coeurs s’assèchent is not bereft of good ideas. Even within the “regular” black metal portions of the record, many creative choices provide strong song direction,–particularly, the guitarwork is excellent. “Quand tout (…)” and “Le ver (…)” in particular stand out for their great riffs, and the guitar harmonies are consistently hypnotizing and compelling throughout. The band is good at building tension and immersion in their dream-like audioscapes. What they’re not so good at though is payoff, and the title track opener is a prime example of this. It starts with a beautiful acoustic passage and morphs gradually into an intense black metal tune. Eventually it drops and goes into a thrilling percussive build-up, but then the pay-off is just lackluster with mediocre riffs and a boring guitar solo. “Quand tout (…)” is almost the exact same structure, but this time with better riffs and dungeon synth effects which I wish were louder in the mix but are pleasant either way. However this time the second half of the song feels disconnected from the first half, giving roughly four minutes of excess meandering.

And unfortunately, there is a lot of meandering on this record. “Voyage céleste” introduces cool trance elements, but the song goes nowhere. The band sometimes up the intensity of the song, but not in a way that builds on what came before, so it’s just random and unmemorable more often than not. The second half of the album is decidedly better with song direction than the first (“Nous sommes passé” is a much better trance-bm song), but the last song “Le blasphémateur” is too monotonous in its main ideas to justify its length. In general, I feel like this album is often stuck in between writing “flow” and clear-cut compositions. It succeeds at both in a vacuum, but together they get in each other’s way and hamper the album’s potential. Lorsque les coeurs s’assèchent is a good album, but it could have been much better.  

Recommended tracks: Quand tout (…), Le ver dans le fruit, Nous sommes passé
You may also like: Abduction, Dordeduh/Negura Bunget, Déhà
Final verdict: 6/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook | Metal-Archives page

Label: Archaic Sound – Bandcamp | Facebook | Official Website

Ars Moriendi is:
– “Arsonist” (everything)

The post Review: Ars Moriendi – Lorsque les coeurs s’assèchent appeared first on The Progressive Subway.

Style: experimental black metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Stravinsky, The Body, The Ruins of Beverast 
Review by: Andy
Country: Belgium, Netherlands
Release date: 7 April, 2023

Ah the trope of the prolific one-man black metal outfit! In the past couple years, Kosm (Void of Nothingness) and Nox Victoria have gained notoriety in my sphere of influence by nearly constantly releasing singles, EPs, and LPs under a slew of names, yet Déhà and Gnaw Their Tongues are some of the OGs. Our Belgian champion of often outside-the-box black metal, Déhà, has thirty-one “currently active” bands on Metallum, and Maurice de Jong of Gnaw Their Tongues clocks in with a tidy thirty. These numbers are for different projects and bands, by the way, not mere albums. I’ve frantically tried to keep up with these artists’ recent output for the last few years, and I couldn’t do anything but laugh when I did my weekly check of their Metallum page and saw they had a split out together. 

…I stopped laughing pretty quickly when the music started. Gnaw Their Tongues’ monolithic “The Sacrificial Dance” initializes the two track split, balancing careful symphonics with slightly sloppier black metal. While many of the previous Gnaw Their Tongues albums are a chaotic menagerie of screeching industrial electronics and biting noisy black metal, this time around, de Jong finds his inspiration in Stravinsky more so than in a haunted construction site. The dense, eerie madness worthy of the Gnaw Their Tongues branding still seeps through, of course—just as if filtered by the regality of SepticFlesh. The track is a delirious ballet with orchestrations flashing out of metal violence like a swarm of bees. As a good modernist track, “The Sacrificial Dance” pushes the boundaries of established paradigms, forcing Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring into new territories of sonic discomfort with its injection of brutality. These modernist techniques further materialize as the track’s crescendos cyclically evaporate into shifting electronics. Maurice de Jong paces “The Sacrificial Dance” excellently, and while occasionally I think the maniacal metal can weaken the impact of the orchestration, it easily ranks among my favorite of Maurice de Jong’s plentiful opera. 

Déhà, however, leans much more into a second-wave black metal onslaught, much happier to pummel at the start than the more ruminative Gnaw Their Tongues contribution. I have no complaints about that, though, as the riffage is consistently head-bangable, occasionally striving toward the fiery harmonized peaks of Mare Cognitum, and the vocals–the highlight of the track–sound uniquely like a furious pterodactyl. The shrieks are unlike almost anything else I’ve heard on a metal record, and I adore the style. Moreover, around the middle, an ominous shift into more ritual ambient prioritizes a subtle chant over bubbling electronics and an almost tribal drum beat. When, in the final few minutes, the two aspects of the track blend together into an epic culmination of Déhà’s vision, the necessity for both tracks to be longform is obvious. The sprawling, Stravinsky-informed journey that Déhà and Gnaw Their Tongues achieve together is astonishingly cool.

So this answers the age-old question of what happens when two of northwestern Europe’s premier workaholics come together… we get some of their combined best work. I do have small gripes about the production, especially how the orchestrations on “The Sacrificial Dance” don’t cut as well through the metal as I’d like. Other issues about the split’s overall flow–a lack of homogeneity between the two tracks especially–also prevent it from reaching the zenith of either of their discogs, but color me impressed with the project. 

Recommended tracks: The Sacrificial Dance, Ritual Action of the Ancestors
You may also like: Tchornobog, Jute Gyte, Omega Infinity, SkyThala
Final verdict: 7.5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | YouTube | Metal-Archives Page

Label: Independent

Déhà and Gnaw Their Tongues are:
– Déhà (everything, Déhà)
– Maurice de Jong (everything, Gnaw Their Tongues)

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