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HANDS OF ORLAC
Hebetudo Mentis

Terror From Hell (2023)
Rating: 8.5/10

Finally, a new full-length album from Malmö, Sweden-based Italian doomsters Hands Of Orlac is upon us with Hebetudo Mentis, the follow-up to the band’s excellent 2014 sophomore effort Figli del crepuscolo.

A new guitarist in the form of Manuele Bonanno has joined the cult as again we are led down a cold, dark passage of creeping nightmares and then into the musty basement where every step resonates with an eerie creak. This is the sort of doom metal I adore because although the tracks are lengthy they drip with suspense and brooding with no time for boredom, because should one lose focus then all manner of horrors lurk in wait.

Opener ‘To The Night A Bride’ begins stark, pensive and like a soundtrack accompanying the opening titles to a stuffy 1970s television thriller. Simple percussive taps, a drifting organ and then the playful ghostly vapours of vocalist The Sorceress, otherwise known as Ginerva, who adds haunting flute as she skips across the dew-damp meadow towards those abbey ruins like a misty spectre.

Comparisons may arise with Blood Ceremony, alongside flickers of Black Widow, Jethro Tull etc. as the combo emanates a rather British folk horror sensibility as if one is sensing a black spectre on the landscape of a sun-drenched cornfield. I enjoy the way Hands Of Orlac brings an unease coupled with a contrasting comfort like crisp autumnal embers. Watch a film like The Blood On Satan’s Claw (1971) after listening to this and you’ll become immersed in the fine, esoteric details I speak of.

Hands Of Orlac offer some interesting changes through the lengthier tracks and with each turn of events there remains a sense of dread. ‘Malenka’ is a big favourite of mine due to some of the genuinely creepy vocal whispers, while ‘Three Eyes’ sounds, rather oddly, like a heavier Blondie! Also, and again, rather peculiarly, is the production which is somewhat raw so that the album has a demo quality, but it still adds to the mesmeric atmosphere. The symbals hiss, the bass rattles and the guitars shuffle rather than lumber.

The chugging on ‘Il Velo Insanguinato’ lacks the meat you’d expect on a doom metal track, but it also shows that this band is something different and forever evolving in spite of being such an elusive beast. Closer ‘Ex Officio Domini (The Executioner Of Rome)’ is an absolute mammoth of a tune which implements traditional 70s rock and more unorthodox rumbling via the weird influence of Italian cult doomsters Black Hole. Strange then how such a stripped back serving can remain so creaky and unnerving, but it is testimony to the strange nature of this clan.

Let’s hope the next chapter doesn’t take as long to construct, but for now I’m happy to linger in this uncanny place built by the Hands Of Orlac.

Neil Arnold

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