ALBUM REVIEW: Cosmic Stimulation of Dark Fantasies – Furze
Norway’s FURZE may not be one of the first names that comes to mind when people think of blackened doom, but the band has been a cult fixture within this particular niche for close to thirty years. The band’s more experimental approach on albums such as 2003’s Necromanzee Cogent and 2015’s Baphomet Wade has firmly established the one man act as an impressive and demented presence within Norway’s scene. Their latest, ninth album, Cosmic Stimulation Of Dark Fantasies, comes hot on the heels of April’s Caw Entrance, and provides a solid, though somewhat mixed, approach to the band’s trademark style.
Intro, a brief, hypnotic piece of acoustic guitar, provides a light and polished introduction to this record, gently lulling the listener into proceedings and gradually incorporating harsher, disjointed passages and ambience, easing the listener into the albums a denser, hazier sound. Beautiful Living On The Left Hand Path Of Death proves to be a muscular slab of classic doom that carries forward some of those subtle immersive and grating aspects, with the vocals adopting an acerbic, biting black metal tone, feeling as though they are being projected from far away rather than vying with the guitars and methodical drumming, lending much of this songs darker, progressive passages, along with heady, dancing synths as the track reaches its climax, resulting in a huge, powerful start to this album that is an incredibly solid way to kick off the album proper.
Cosmic Stimulation Of Dark Fantasies continues with a similar formula to its predecessor, with the warm, swampy guitars being strengthened by a stringent, energetic approach to its hooks, with the sound possessing an urgency and caustic, chaotic edge that’s more typical of black metal, making this incredibly impactful. It takes the jarring, discordant sound that has been hinted at earlier and puts it to prominent use, blending seamlessly with the chunkier backbone of this song to create something that’s much closer to black ‘n’ roll at points, without ever fully straying away from their doomy template, creating a style that’s adventurous, though still rough around the edges.
Caw Entrance reverts to the ponderous, groove-laden mould of Beautiful Living On The Left Hand Path Of Death, with the higher-pitched vocal delivery and spoken word flourishes moving away from the gravelly growl of earlier offerings, meaning that the angular guitars, which intermittently lurch towards a tighter, melodic approach, provide the bulk of the hooks. The rumbling, melancholic funereal dirge that dominates the second half is perhaps its most effective section, embracing a dramatic and bleak sound that’s a great inclusion that serves as a precursor to what follows. Waswasah is arguably one of best songs on the record from FURZE, leaning massively into the bubbling distortion and underlying psychedelia touched upon on previous tracks. It’s a song that couples weighty guitar work and authoritative drumming with confident vocals that, unlike earlier efforts, sit firmly at the top of the mix, meaning that their true impact can be felt, complementing the impressive riffs and synths extremely well, acting as perhaps the most effective marriage of black metal and doom.
Marrow Creed provides an atmospheric and immersive take on the style of the song that immediately preceded it, retaining the murky guitar sound, tar-thick, cavernous basslines and a great, progressive element creeping into the songwriting that creates a looser, free form sound that works perfectly, peppering in subtle space rock flourishes to make for an even more expansive and engrossing sound, bringing this record to a close with a stunning, Planet Caravan-esque brand of fuzzed-out desert rock that serves as another album highlight.
Cosmic Stimulation Of Dark Fantasies is an album of two halves from FURZE, one that is impressive and another that is solid, but ultimately falls a little short of how impactful it could have potentially been. When it comes to the album’s opener, along with the excellent final two offerings, there’s a lot of brilliant, imaginative songwriting that’s easy to get immersed in, and had this formula been adopted throughout, this would have been a stunning record from back to front. The three tracks that comprise the middle of this record, in spite of their expansive feel at points, fall victim at times to the pairing together of a rawer production alongside a more rhythmic brand of doom, meaning that there are points when this unfortunately lacks the necessary heft and hooks that make lengthy, drama-laden songs like this require.
If these three songs had been given a weightier mix and been subject to the kind of experimental touches that made Waswasah and Marrow Creed, this would have been fantastic, and it’s a shame that some of these three songs didn’t possess a dense and adventurous edge, as it’s clear that even these weaker points are still powerful in their own right.
Rating: 6/10
Cosmic Stimulation Of Dark Fantasies is out now via Devoted Art Propaganda.
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