Witchsorrow: The Devil Rides Out
UK doom has undergone a massive resurgence over the past decade, with the likes of CONAN, BOSS KELOID, DESERT STORM and GOBLINSMOKER taking the traditional blueprint laid down by SABBATH in the 70s and putting a 21st Century spin on things. Overseeing this revival are scene veterans WITCHSORROW, a traditional doom metal trio formed in 2005 in pursuit of creating the very purest form of the genre. Hot on the heels of the release of their critically acclaimed album The Devil And All His Works, we sat down to discuss everything slow and heavy with frontman and guitarist Necroskull and bassist Emily Witch.
We started with their previous album – 2018’s Hexenhammer – and the reasons behind the eight year gap between that record and their latest release. Unsurprisingly, the Covid lockdowns played their part. “Coming out of lockdown was a weird time,” explains Necroskull. “We realised that we were just completely out of sync with what the rest of the world was doing.”
“We were just so focused on getting back to playing live,” continues Emily, “that as soon as things started to open up again that was all we were thinking about. We weren’t really that creative during the lockdowns because part of us was thinking ‘well what’s the point in writing loads of new stuff if we can’t actually go and play it for people?’”
In the end it was actually the impending departure of drummer David Wilbrahammer (now replaced by Scott ‘Doom’ Taylor) that helped the band focus on writing together again. “Our last drummer David had found out he was going to be a dad and that he probably couldn’t do that and still be as committed to the band,” says Necroskull. “So that kind of made us stop and think: ‘Right, we actually need to finish off all these ideas we’ve been knocking around for the last few years’. It had been great to get back to gigging again but that was the catalyst we needed to focus on making another album.”
The weirdly timeless period of the Covid lockdowns wasn’t completely unproductive though, as a lot of the riffs that have found their way on to The Devil And All His Works were knocking around way back then. After a while though, when it seemed like maybe nothing would ever open up again, Necroskull – like so many of us – lost his drive somewhat. “At first I was actually doing pretty well with the ideas and riffs. I realised I would never have this much time on my hands to be creative again so I was really disciplined and made sure at first that I was picking up my guitar for at least two hours every day. Omnia Finiuntur (the album’s opening track) was written pretty early during that period and I remember thinking ‘oh wow maybe this is all going to come together really easily’. Then I wrote a second song which was complete balls, so I left it all alone for a bit. But a lot of the ideas for this album were initially created during that time.”
The album takes its title from a Dennis Wheatley book, which explores the conflict between good and evil or light and darkness throughout human history. Naturally, this was a great fit thematically for the occult, folk-horror focused world of WITCHSORROW. “Tonally all that stuff is just perfect – that world is very much where the inception of the band, and even our name, comes from,” Emily confirms. “Being inspired by bands like CATHEDRAL and ELECTRIC WIZARD, it’s hard to get away from that sort of stuff really.”
“I like a lot of other types of music and lyrics – especially when they tell stories about very everyday things – but I just cannot do that for whatever reason,” adds Necroskull. “Whenever I‘ve tried it just sounds BAD. I think it helps generate the right vibe as well though if you’re singing about witches and Hell and Satan and all that stuff. It immediately puts you in a fantastical doom world of folky horror that allows you to escape from everything real and miserable. All the Dennis Wheatley 60s and 70s occult stuff is such a great aesthetic for a start but that whole book is actually quite anthropological. It explores all sorts of stuff about ideas of magic, power and the self which are again all topics that everyone can relate to in a way. It’s just dressed up in really unique imagery and language.”
These ideas are woven throughout the album, both in its explorations of evil, darkness and death but also in celebrating elements of those things. “With the album taking so long, obviously you’re going to experience doubt and things like losing people so it’s natural that a lot of those things appear thematically on the record,” says Emily. “With David leaving too it did almost feel like sometimes the Devil was messing with us. Like every so often something would happen and we’d be thinking ‘Oh God what’s coming next?!’”
Necroskull wanted to explore the duality that comes with those things too, though. “At the other end of that though there is an element of celebration in it all. The song A Quintessance Of Dust (the album’s monstrous closer) is a good example of that. It was a tough song to write and for ages I only really had the bones of it and lyrically it was all pretty sad and miserable but I wanted there to be triumph at the end of it all. There’s this bit part way through where the song changes and it’s signalled by the lyric bring out your dead! which is meant to be a way of celebrating those who we’ve lost along the way. It’s like our own dark way of presenting that duality of light in the darkness which runs throughout the whole record.”
The Devil And All His Works is a powerful modern interpretation of classic doom but, with all the different directions the genre has been taken in recently, were the band ever tempted to add in some random space noises and crazy time signatures to keep up with more recent developments within the scene? Emily thinks it’s all about influence. “I think a lot of those bands have had a more proggy introduction to doom than us. Maybe they’ve come to it through the likes of MASTODON rather than our more traditional influences. It all kind of goes in cycles really.”
“While I love all that stuff,” concludes Necroskull, “I just wouldn’t know where to start writing music like that. The difference with us is that we are kind of stubbornly – and maybe slightly ignorantly – a metal band. And I don’t think we’ve ever really thought about doing anything else.”
The Devil And All His Works is out now via Church Road Records. View this interview, alongside dozens of other killer bands, in glorious print magazine fashion in DS132 here.
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