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CENTURY
Sign Of The Storm

Dying Victims Productions / Electric Assault (2025)
Rating: 8.5/10

Swedish duo Century have been on a lot of people’s lips since impressing five years ago with their 2020 four-song demo, but where Staffan Tengnér and Leo Ekström Sollenmo really hit the spot was with debut full-length The Conquest Of Time in 2023. The Stockholm-based twosome captured perfectly the dark and majestic lure of the 80s on that record and a lot of that could be put down to the production. Let’s face it, for every genuinely organic throwback metal act around there are at least a dozen succumbing to over-production, but not in the case of Century.

With this sophomore opus there is a real sense of 70s stuffiness combined with a bewitching 80s mood which results in a wonderfully smooth vocal style from Staffan which is also reflected in his guitar tone. Couple this with Leo’s bass and drums and you have a rich fluidity that levels out somewhere between Heavy Load and Manilla Road while peppered with the usual springs of Iron Maiden, Blue Öyster Cult and a host of rumbling New Wave Of British Heavy Metal acts, including Satan.

Somehow laced with shades of doom and quintessentially British Gothicness, Sign Of The Storm opens with ‘Sacrifice’, a stark, bare bones galloper blessed with a melancholic simplicity in its formation and lyrical content as Witchfynde’s sinister shades ooze to the forefront on the trickle of percussion. Due to the earthy production values the vocals boast a basement echo, suggesting that those mournful warbles are somewhat subdued by the damp patches that leer back from the sodden corners. It’s this exact moodiness and cellar dwelling aura that makes this album such a pleasure to hear. Those cool distant echoes and busy riffs on ‘Children Of The Past’ stir up wisps of library shelf dust, such is the nostalgic whiffs.

Century boasts a haunting sound, one which conjures up past spirits like a warped Ouija board. ‘Fly Away’ begins like an old Marillion cut seeping out of the speakers from some late night radio rock show, but once it begins to gallop the delivery is effortless, and that’s the word which continuously springs to mind throughout this enigmatic platter.

The opening acoustics of ‘The Chains Of Hell’ remind me in part of Fastway’s ‘If You Could See’ before a blanket of darkness muffled the fizz and Century lopes once again through the barricades of nostalgic heavy rock. Meanwhile, ‘Necromancer’ is the band at their busiest, stripping back the satanic gauze of Bathory but adding extra cosy padding in the borderline speed metal contours. The sublime nature of it all results in a cloak and dagger swagger bereft of twists but instead relying on vintage values.

Damn, there are so many bands spouting this sort of retro metal, but in breezes Century like they were there 40 years ago. With candles dripping over chalky skulls, leather strides of each member creaking like old stairs and an odour of stale sweat, warm beer and graveyard moss, Century moodily stomps over dusty floorboards with ‘Possessed By The Night’, made all the more emphatic by the militant drums. ‘Fallen Hero’ briskly nods towards old Iron Maiden, as does the effectively warm ‘Sorceress’, but after repeated listens my soul is left feeling fuzzy and cosy, as if some long forgotten charming memory has suddenly resurfaced to the scent of my old leather jacket.

Century just simply taps into an era they were never part of, but by understanding the feel of that time this remarkable duo has created a traditional metal pastiche that through all of its innocence no doubt holds a dark secret within the confines of those enchanting riffs, pulsating beats and wispy vocals. This storm has been brewing for a while but now it’s rattling the door knobs and demanding entry, so let it in and become one with this dark art expression.

Neil Arnold

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