Do you like feeling grim and unsettled? Do you also want to somehow lose yourself in that mood, giving yourself away to ominous, melancholy despondence? Then pay heed to the spirits emanating from this Chilean band's excellent debut album. Sporae Autem Yuggoth has arrived with their first full-length of all-enveloping doom-death. Judging from this album, we may have a new metal titan roaming the lands (festival organizers: don't sleep on this band).
The band advertises themselves as "death-doom metal in the old spirit, creating the darkest and most desolate atmospheres without losing a strong sense of authenticity and identity." This is certainly true, the band doesn't simply try and pass off a copy of Onward to Golgotha, Mental Funeral, or As the Flower Withers and hope no one notices. This is a band with its own voice, a deep and haunting one.
The band embodies many of the same tropes as the Dark Descent set, but incorporates a lot of other moods, aided by the eerie keyboard work of Johanna Sánchez. There's also the reverb-heavy guitar lines from José Gallardo. These elements, in combination, actually bring another set of bands to mind. That's right, the band has a real funeral doom streak in them. Fans of Skepticism, Disembowlment, and Evoken will find a lot to like here (in the latter case, especially if you really dig Shades of Night Descending and Embrace the Emptiness).
But again, you can't simply slap that label on the band either, as they have the capacity for producing shorter-form rippers like "Disintegration," which gives the listener a nice break between the mammoth on the previous and following tracks. That said, those two songs ("Colossus Larvae" and "Disguise The Odius Spirits") are so immersive that I don't mind that they stretch beyond the 10-minute mark.
I also appreciated the ambient tracks (6 and the closer at 8), as they're placed well within the album to give it a cinematic feel. They serve as a entrance and exit to the searing "Through Dominion To Interlude," which features some high-pitched tremolo guitar leads that stand out across the otherwise doomy landscape.
On the whole, the album gives you the feeling of exploring a long-buried series of caves, tombs and underground palaces. It's a place haunted by ancient spirits of kingdoms long gone. It's a sign of great band when they can make long, plodding songs that also grab the imagination and leave you eager to hear more.
Oblivion never felt so soothing.
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