Abythic – Dominion of the Wicked
3 min read
Band: Abythic
Title: Dominion of the Wicked
Label: Iron Bonehead Productions
Release date: 12 February 2021
Country: Germany
Format reviewed: High-quality Digital Recording
And German metal is on the menu once again!
Abythic has actually been reviewed before here at BAZ, first in 2018 when “Beneath Ancient Portals” was released, review done by Wolven Deadsoul, and again a year later in 2019 when “Conjuring the Obscure” came around, then reviewed by my dear friend Tom. Now it is my turn, “Dominion of the Wicked” is just around the corner and it will be interesting to see if the group has managed to hold on to their charm.
With only four tracks on the album, the first one is “At the Threshold of Obscurity” and tops out at almost 15 minutes. With an eerie start, which is sort of foreseen with this genre, it adds chills and a spoken segment. The music has the old school sound to it with a death metal-ish melody in the background as the rhythm guitars strike the chords. With an almost three-minute-long intro that is the point where the vocals come in in a dark and growly shout style. Overall, it’s on the horror side with a repetitive effect of the main riff going on for the first five minutes at least. Much more melodies are baked in than one would expect, hidden away in a fitting way and not tempered with to reach any sort of perfection.
“The Call” includes a similar guitar melody as the first track; however it sounds played by itself as the background ambient sound to fill out the space with lurks and chills. The turn it takes resembles Entombed, but it feels almost like an experience of its own instead of actually listening to music. Like sitting in a room watching a movie where the vocals play its part and the instruments a different part. Disturbing chanting then turns it into a horror movie. Clocking in at almost 9 minutes, the only change that really comes around is at the 8th minute which in my own opinion is a bit late to keep my interest up.
Building on the same melody as the previous track, “Endless Tides” does have a slightly faster tempo and I do like the groovy straight forward headbang feeling it includes. It´s the first song that really feels like a song, as it has more traditional build to it and does not revolve so much around atmosphere as the first two did.
“Augury of the Doomed” is the last track, and even if its just number four, it feels like its number nine. Some dissonant chords and melodies resembling the traditional slowed down death metal makes this sound like the slowest track of the album even if the first one was rather slow as well but did have different elements that made it sound faster than it really was. Since the slow guitars aren’t exactly in tune, it creates a slightly disturbing and almost even pungent feel to the overall soundscape. The church organ in the background add to that feeling, however the vocals are diverse enough to make the track pop in a way that is really needed.
This type of music is quite specific, in no way was it crap but let me assure you that fans of Cannibal Corpse or Deicide won’t find this much to their liking. Darkened doom metal fans might find a treasure within. 6.5/10 Julia Katrin
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6.5/10 We may survive!
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