RSS Feed


FUNERAL FOG
13th Moon

Ancient Temple Recordings (2022)
Rating: 8/10

With the darker night’s drawing in and frost tapping on the window it seems only right that grim black metal should be the soundtrack to such a season. My choice is Canadian cultists Funeral Fog and their third full-length studio outing, 13th Moon.

This mystical fraternity split up in 2007 but returned four years ago and 13th Moon is very much the fruits of their phantasmagoric labour. Creepy echoing vocal sneers, stark biting axe work and a general feel of utter desolation are the key points here as the band unleashes some excellent mid-paced passages of coldness (‘Return Of The Dead’) which mix well, and in tremendous atmospheric fashion with the pacier parts.

It’s classic, true cult black metal dripping with morbidity and illuminated by a freezing moon which brings vigour to those melodious streaks of the macabre. Put this alongside any second wave of black metal composition and it will not wither. Instead, you get treated to a batch of well-constructed designs that unravel as suspenseful and grim tidings.

From the ominous threads of ‘My Darkest Shadow’ with its subtle variances to the primitive clank of ‘Blood Eagle’ and beyond, this is an effective, old school delight daubed in rawness and which does exactly what it says on the tin of corpse paint.

Neil Arnold

<< Back to Album & EP Reviews



Related Posts via Categories
Share