Watain - Sworn to the Dark
March 22 2008 at 01:27:02 AM
Uppsala’s Watain enjoys the fortune of having unleashed nothing but magisterial Black Metal. The band’s two full-lengths
Rabid Death’s Curse and
Casus Luciferi amalgamated an aesthetic somewhere between early Mayhem and Dissection, creating bona fide masterpieces lent gravitas by their intellectual lyrical themes, which coupled with respective artwork created a fiercely unified and respectable vision.
Sworn to the Dark, Watain’s third full-length, shares little in common with its predecessors, however, boldly treading deeper into composition redolent of Dissection’s best work. Regardless,
Sworn is a recording that gestates, slowly working its way into the mind and, ultimately, into favor. The guitar work here is of undeniable beauty; interplay and riffs from “Legions of the Black Night,” “Darkness and Death,” and the title track are stunning and warm, powerful and marked by a proud, remarkable precision. The unusually clean sound will doubtlessly turn more than a few off, but it’s a welcome alteration. If there is a criticism, its length, which allows the mind to wander even while the music is terrifically in focus.
[Stewart Voegtlin]
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