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FAUSTCOVEN
In The Shadow Of Doom

Nuclear War Now! Productions (2018)
Rating: 8/10

There is no deadlier volcano than one which has remained dormant for some time but only then to erupt, resulting in all hell breaking loose as well as the loss of life and swallowed lands.

For six years, Norway’s Faustcoven have been laying low, commander in chief Gunnar Hansen and compatriot Johnny Tombthrasher waiting in the shadows. Now they have re-emerged, hungry and fresh.

In The Shadow Of Doom is their fourth full-length release; another strange old brew of an album that boasts eight “infernal hymns” projected from the mind set of Hansen, who has created a myriad of twisted riffs to accompany his sickening dry barks. Around him, a structure of pounding percussion acts as a vast catacomb of reverberations and echoes as the duo cast bewitching spells that are essentially death / black / doom vibrations of ill-light and obscure dynamism.

This latest album marks a clear progression from 2012’s Hellfire And Funeral Bells, and it comes littered with ghastly maws of dread teaming with ominous riffage and classic doom arrangements which are filtered through more progressive and unusual channels.

Opener ‘The Wicked Dead’ has a somewhat stark rumble about its details; the eerie clanks full of angular designs as one suddenly anticipates an icy speed blast, but it doesn’t come. Faustcoven instead opt for a morose and evil trudge of immense suspense, the track offering an abrasive style of drudgery as those authoritative vocal rasps lead us further into the depths.

The almost bluesy opening of ‘The Devil’s Share’ begins like a David Lynch-meets-Danzig composition before the sudden onset of crushing doom comes juddering. Arguably the best monolithic slab on offer, ‘The Devil’s Share’ is a huge sounding creation, and a brooding and lumbering entity so colossal. Then again, ‘Yet He Walks’ is also top-notch and considerably icier and sombre; again we have that black-death feel as a lead squirms its wondrous way through the thick walls as the pace drops with the temperature, and the track heaves its heavy arse to the finish line.

‘Marching In The Shadow’ continues the themes of dread with the distorted slog and ghastly moans; this one really does ache as each instrument plods like a funeral procession straight to the cold grave. The only let up in proceedings appears to be the short juggernaut jam that is ‘Sign Of Satanic Victory’; a tumble of instrumental clamour as the churning turbines of doom rotate with steely effect.

The heavyweight monstrosities keep on coming though, all led by those grotesque drools. ‘Lair Of Rats’ is a clanking doom mess, while ‘As White As She Was Pale’ is a stark, wasted nod. Eight-minute closer ‘Quis Est Iste Qui Venit’ chills the spine with its frosty, distant signals; the instrumentation is one huge, bleak beacon standing forlorn in the white wilderness as the hopeless vocal slurs coat the toxic traipse of the guitar, leading me into a pit of despair and inevitable doom.

Faustcoven may not be to everyone’s tastes; their style of doom is isolating and frightful, Hansen and partner responsible for a heavily atmospheric and yet detached experience built upon doom ethics and more.

Neil Arnold

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