Crypt Sermon – The Stygian Rose
Crypt Sermon- The Stygian Rose
Dark Descent Records
Release Date: 14/06/2024
Running Time: 44:50
Review by Rory Bentley
10/10 (that’s 10 Scrying Orbs)
It’s been five long years since Epic Doom revivalists Crypt Sermon absolutely blew my socks off with the magnificent “The Ruins of Fading Light,” an album that went toe to toe with a collection of seminal new releases that got me through some rough times and rekindled my love for heavy music tenfold. The band’s mixture of classic Candlemass, Solitude Aeternus, a sprinkling of Dungeon Synth and a huge dollop of crunching Thrash aggression was irresistible to me. The perfect balance of Dio-era Sabbath bombast with some rabid, borderline-Hardcore thuggishness offered up a rare example of having one’s sonic cake and eating it, as the more theatrical orb-pondering moments were brought down to street-level with guitars that could remove tattoos. Like Candlemass if they ate 20 egg whites for breakfast and spent all day deadlifting. Now, finally, album number three “The Stygian Rose” has burst out of a haunted mirror in a dank, secluded castle and Crypt Sermon are ready to throw down with some more sublime Epic Doom.
As far as opening salvos go, ‘Glimmers In The Underworld’ is gonna take some beating. Unlike a lot of Doom bands Crypt Sermon aren’t afraid to put their foot down and break the speed limit, and the pacy riffage that kicks things off after a woozy atmospheric intro is Heavy Metal heaven, helped in no small part by the production skills of the peerless Arthur Rizk. Brooks Wilson’s raspy towering bark drives things forward like a cross between Dio and Lee Dorian and the song sways between sinister arpeggios, ripping solos and stomping mid-paced grooves. Lyrically it’s everything one could ever want from a Metal song dialled up to 11, with Wilson proclaiming “I’ll die with my eyes wide open just to catch a good look at hell” at one point, and the closing line where he warns that the demons are “right behind you in the black black BLACK!” is possibly the best ending to a song I’ve heard all year as the guitars, bass and drums percussively stab along to every utterance of ‘black’. Fucking sensational.
‘Thunder (Perfect Mind)’ follows a more traditional Doom format, but it does it just about as perfectly as anyone ever has. The lyrics and vocal performance are arcane and dramatic like an old mariner warning of otherworldly forces with malevolent designs, and the riffs are a bewitching mix of sinister melody and barbaric force that you could easily imagine being strummed out by Cthulhu during his down time. The leadwork here is utterly magnificent as well, with an extended solo section that sounds like Richie Blackmore and Tony Iommi squaring off at the gates of hell. Throw in a super catchy chorus and you have yourself a total rager that legion of Trad Metal revivalist bands could only dream of writing. It is perfectly complemented with the more upbeat but no less sinister ‘Down In The Hollow’, which drips with atmosphere and has some shudder inducing vocal harmonies that invoke the darkest aspects of Alice In Chain’s “Dirt”. It’s a pure headbanger throughout that is worthy of any pit and a great example of the album’s immaculate sequencing and pacing.
‘Heavy is the Crown of Bone’ is next, and it is easy to see why it was first choice as a single, with the band opting for a tighter, slicker, but no less impactful songwriting approach. The primary riff gallops along forcefully like Metallica locking into a Black album groove, yet there is a tempo and mood change for the chorus that is accomplished like some sort of sorcery. I don’t know how we got from stadium-crushing 4/4 stomps to full-on wizard on a thundery mountain Gothic drama, but I’m sure glad we got there- particularly when there’s a huge vocal hook waiting at the end of the labyrinthine path we take. In addition to being the most immediate track on here, it offers the perfect palette cleanser to the album’s dark, dense and sprawling finale.
‘The Scrying Orb’ is a melodic masterpiece of theatrical darkness and the natural successor to Candlemass’s iconic 80s orb-pondering torch song ‘The Crystal Ball’. It has the Gregorian chants, the evil chord progressions and a singer competing for the world record of spooky warbling. The synths that accompany the main riff sound like they’re ripped from a Hammer Horror score, dripping with camp, gruesome menace. Of course, the song does the heavily-used quiet verse/massive distorted part trick, but it’s so damn good it feels totally fresh.By the time the teased chorus finally kicks in it feels gargantuan and more satisfying than a cold goblet of beer after a long day’s necromancing. It does absolutely everything I want from this kind of music. And it doesn’t stop there.
The title track takes the word epic to a whole new echelon in a staggering 11 minutes of evil splendour. Tanner Anderson’s mournful piano offers a moment of tranquil melancholic beauty before gigantic riffs to rival peak Mastodon kick in to planet-smashing effect. Wilson flits effortlessly between a gentle croon to a razor throated shriek in the eerily serene verses before conducting the band to an apocalyptic crescendo. Proggy without being over indulgent, flamboyant without being cheesy and heavy as hell without being one dimensional it’s the perfect summation of everything the album does so well.
At the end of this journey into the underworld I’m left with no choice but to slap a big old 10 on the record. It does everything I loved about the previous records better, the songwriting is sharper, the vocals have improved and the guitars are astonishing. This is an album that is as good as any album in the subgenre, and beyond that a record that could go round for round with any Heavy Metal album you’d care to name. So pay the ferryman, grab some tinnies for the ride and take a journey down the Styx with Crypt Sermon- evil never sounded so good!
TRACKLISTING:
01. Glimmers in the Underworld
02. Thunder (Perfect Mind)
03. Down in the Hollow
04. Heavy is the Crown of Bone
05. Scrying Orb
06. The Stygian Rose
LINE-UP:
Brooks Wilson – Vocals
Enrique Sagarnaga – Drums
Steve Jansson – Guitars
Frank Chin – Guitars
Matt Knox – Bass
Tanner Anderson – Keyboards
LINKS:
Disclaimer: This review is solely the property of Rory Bentley and Ever Metal. It is strictly forbidden to copy any part of this review, unless you have the strict permission of both parties. Failure to adhere to this will be treated as plagiarism and will be reported to the relevant authorities.