Time and The Hunter – Weapon Part I
Time and The Hunter – Weapon Part I
Inertial Music (North America on Season of Mist US)
Release Date: 25/04/25
Running Time: 44:55
Review by Dark Juan
123,456,789/10
Hello, you lot out there who may occasionally read this nonsense. I am Dark Juan, and I work under the probably misguided compulsion to write things about music and expect that you might enjoy it. I am also compelled to spend three hundred words talking about absolute bollocks. For that, I apologise. However, it has been disheartening to see recently that the UK courts have ruled that trans women who hold gender recognition certificates are not women in the eyes of the law. This is absolutely disgusting to Dark Juan, who promotes love for everybody. Funnily enough, in a spectacular example of the patriarchy in action, not a mention of female-to-male transgendered persons were made in this ruling, merely that trans women are essentially not women. This is entirely unacceptable. I am personal friends with some trans women, some of whom are important parts of the UK Extreme music scene, none of whom pose any even slight threat to biological women and indeed have their own tales to tell about they have also been mistreated by men.
Dark Juan is an ally of trans people, the queer, the intersex, the asexual or whatever. It is of no consequence to me how others live their lives, only that they are decent folk. It is no business of mine or anyone else how someone chooses to live their life, or what they must do to feel comfortable in their own skin. One only needs to look at the reprehensible behaviour of J.K. Rowling following this ruling. However, I will not pretend that I am knowledgeable enough to have a truly informed opinion on these matters and will instead content myself with being a safe space for my trans friends, who have transitioned both ways. People are people, and we all bleed red.
Now that’s off my chest (Mrs Dark Juan is relieved because I have been a right grumpy arsehole all day) I can talk about the record we are going to place reverently upon the esteemed Platter of Splatter ™. It is by a duo from Sweden and Italy called Time and The Hunter, and its title is “Weapon Part I”. I have been sitting on this record for a couple of months because it had a long release date, and I have listened to it so many times that the words “Run, creature, run” have been emblazoned on my brain.
Sleep Token-esque atmospherics, lovelorn rhapsodies, and percussion meld with the grandiosity of Ghost at their most pompous. Roots of Electronic Industrial and Darkwave combine in a haunting, intoxicating witches’ brew of occultism, pumping Industrial backbeats, and ethereal wafting on the opening song ‘Mycelium’. It’s dark and groovy and absolutely captivating all at once. This lulls the unsuspecting listener into a false sense of security, thinking that this album is going to be sensuous, ethereal Darkwave and Electronica, until the terrifyingly heavy guitar kicks in and flattens the listener against whatever the nearest vertical surface is and slowly crushes you against it on the second song, ‘The Great Disturbance’. The guitar sound is overwhelmingly colossal. It is huge. It overpowers everything by design. Don’t get me wrong, classical guitar, an Aaron Stainthorpe-like baritone vocal, and keyboards fool the listener first. There are not words, however, to describe just how massive, how utterly overpowering the electric alchemy of the guitar work on this song is. It’s heavier than an orbital bombardment of depleted uranium-tipped kinetic penetrators descending directly onto your own woefully unprotected head, although this is juxtaposed with moments of staggering, morose beauty.
‘The Following Silence’ changes the dynamic again, with some absolutely lush as fuck harmonies and a heartbroken-sounding lead vocal that hints at an explosion of emotion, treading that bleeding edge between absolute sorrow and absolute, red, all-consuming rage. This tension just increases throughout the song, as the tempo increases and the hard edge of distortion creeps through the synth work. Yet, it doesn’t let go of its humanity and stays within the boundaries of “normal” behaviour instead of exploding into a scarlet welter of indiscriminate violence.
Yes, my people, we are once again in the realm of what I would consider to be modern Gothic music. Bleeding-heart pianos and swooping, ethereal synth work abound, combined with a sensual, darkly sexy baritone lead vocal. However, it doesn’t stray into the realm of parodic Goth cabaret in the vein of, say, Cradle of Filth. There are wider influences at work. I hear the sound of early Anathema, and Paradise Lost (their “One Second” era, particularly), and My Dying Bride beyond the keyboards and piano. This is no surprise, however, as Niklas Sundin was famously the lead guitarist of Dark Tranquillity and has his own solo project in Mitochondrial Sun. The music of Time and The Hunter is cinematic in scale and scope, while it eschews what we would describe as heaviness in the classic sense of the word by using distorted guitars sparingly, it doesn’t let up on the emotional component of Extreme music one little bit.
The thing is, “Weapon Part I” is a thing of dark and dangerous beauty. It is like a moonlit walk through a forest chock-full of predators. It is disturbing, but gorgeous at the same time. It hints at the dangers lying just off the well-trodden path you are walking. It is the sounds of things stalking through the undergrowth, what lurks just beyond the pitiful light of your torch, and the fact that if that light fails, your throat will be torn out by fang and claw; yet you still trudge onward, mechanically, driven by something unknown to continue, hoping that safety waits beyond that next bend in the path, yet you still stop occasionally to gaze wonderingly at the beauty of the moonlight shining through the canopy of lush trees, the breeze moving the grass alongside the dirt path you are traversing. This is when you realise just how small you are, yet you are also overpoweringly complex. Sonder overwhelms you as you suddenly comprehend that you wouldn’t be missed, but the next person who happens along your path is just as unique as you are – their life full of the same incidents, escapades and encounters, and a shitload of different ones and that they too are just as much an individual composed of myriad experiences as you are.
The Patented Dark Juan Blood Splat Rating System is conflicted about whether it should break its own rules again, mainly because there are elements of Metal on this album, especially the excoriating guitar work on ‘The Great Disturbance’, but the record is primarily Darkwave and very Gothic with some elements of Electronic Industrial in the percussion and some of the background sounds. This conflicts with Dark Juan’s stated rule of automatically deducting a mark because it isn’t Metal enough, but Jesus fucking holy high Christ in a chariot-driven sidecar, this is a fucking incredible record, and almost a religious epiphany for Dark Juan. Hence it will get 123,456,789/10.
Thank you for your time and attention in this matter. Good afternoon!
TRACKLISTING:
01. Mycelium
02. The Great Disturbance
03. The Following Silence
04. The Deep
05. Preamble
06. Sundial
07. Chaos and Stones
08. Lyrica
09. Ars es Bestia
10. Berlin
LINE-UP:
Niklas Sundin
Enrico Longhin
LINKS:
Disclaimer: This review is solely the property of Dark Juan 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.
