In twenty days Finnish Symphonic Black Metal duo Pestilent Hex are due to lay siege to every prone mortal form with their latest full length album ‘Sorceries Of Sanguine & Shadow’.
Released by Debemur Morti Productions, this atmospheric and highly accessable seven track opus begins with the tinkling keys of haunting intro track ‘Nocturne’ which then segues into the neck snapping riffs and keyboard drenched layering of opening track ‘Sciomancy and Sortilege’. The manner violent riffs are threaded through the melancholic tones of this track are majestic!
‘Through Mirrors Beyond’ opens with a bleak motif which then convulses atop a rousing stampede of sorrowful melodies and grunting vocals. Although there is a definitive sense of incandescent darkness threaded through this track I found its tone to be more melancholic and less melancholic. The instrumentation and tight rhythmic changes herein must be applauded.
‘Of Hexcraft and laws three-fold’ is a pummeling piece of black magick where menacing guitar riffs, churning rhythms and occult oriented splendor conjure forth a track of the most transcendent proportions!
‘Spectral Voyage’ with its midtempo pace and melancholic riffs tends to plod along with aplomb as its rhythmic vices and sorrowful melodies make love beneath the full moon.
‘Threnody Of The Moon Ascendant’ is a theatrical slice of smoldering Black Metal that is seeped in menace as much as it bristles with bluster. This track is a veritable pantomime that moves at a propulsive pace.
‘Sanguine Gnosis’ which brings this blistering grimoire to a close is a mammoth behemoth that brings ‘Sorceries Of Sanguine And Shadow’ to a close in a grand manner.
-Asher Locketz-