"Burning hatred towards everything and everyone."
You can't argue with that sort of commitment, nor to the gloriously old school, lo-fi aesthetics of Wolftower's new release, Funeral Swords, right down to the mass-xeroxed, colour-inverted front cover and gothic fonts.
Maybe then I'm not tired of black metal? Perhaps all that was needed was an angry photocopier and some corpsepaint.
The album itself is a wonderful combination of old school, second wave black metal and some of that dungeon synth that the bold young things are talking about these days.
Crucially, both elements work really well. The black metal is sharp, focused and makes a good impact from the start, as much engaging the listener with its rich, complex compositions as its suicidally harsh beats and riffs.
The keyboard bits, both in the songs and in their own tracks, do not suck either, with some wonderfully bleak compositions which include acoustic guitars.
The studio mix, while obviously done on a budget, is also crisp and clear. You can hear all the instruments, and the overall primitiveness of it helps, not detracts, from the end product.
It's also a relatively short album, coming in at just over 25 minutes. On the other hand, this does, at least, mean it avoids the trap of meandering away, and is instead a much tighter, focused blizzard beast than some black metal releases I could mention.
In summary then, this is enough to make even the most suicidally dejected, bleak and nihilistic soul want to live again. As such, it is an utter, utter failure, and should never be bought ever.
SHEEPSCORE: No Trends, No Tosh (4 out of 5)
Available now on the official Wolftower Bandcamp page.
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