ALBUM REVIEW: From The Wound Spilled Forth Fire – Nixil
Baltimore’s NIXIL may only be in the earliest stages of their career as a band and not produced much in the way of music so far – having only released two albums since their 2019 formation – but the Maryland quintet are already establishing themselves as a creative force within the US and international black metal scene. Their 2021 debut album, All Knots Untied, was a great slab of incredibly dark black metal that managed to bring together sonic dissonance and polished melodicism in a way that many bands would struggle to do without sacrificing some of the cohesion within an album’s sound. Their second album, From The Wound Spilled Forth Fire, builds upon the foundations that its predecessor brilliantly laid down, and serves as an even leaner, harder and more impressive version of the sound displayed on that record.
Collapsing The Poles is an incredibly intense start to the record, with magnificently grating hooks, intricate drums and acerbic vocals all contributing to a visceral and domineering sound. It strikes a delicate balance between discordance and slick, punchy flourishes extremely well, possessing a polish that makes even the more unhinged moments feel accessible. The vocals similarly cover a wide range, matching the eclectic approach of the music. This song’s closing moments bleed seamlessly into the start of In Thrall, a track with a denser, rhythmic sound, interspersed with jarring leads and muscular vocals, with fleeting bursts of brutality adding a chaotic edge to what is, initially at least, a weighty and mid-paced affair, gradually shifting towards a rabid, speed-driven style as it progresses, ratcheting up the belligerence until it reaches its dizzying climax.
A Door Never Closed couples lean guitar work with frenetic drums and bestial vocals, with the blistering tempos adding to the vicious effect, feeling like a more straight forward, but exceptionally impressive, take on black metal than the preceding tracks. There are a lot of slower, ponderous moments peppered liberally throughout that let the darker, brooding guitars take centre stage, meaning that the music ebbs and flows between its more focused moments and decidedly more melancholic ones with ease, making this a powerful and engrossing number.
Next comes the album’s titular track, a cavernous, borderline avant-garde affair that embraces melodic leads tinged with experimental touches, percussive drums and stringent vocals to create a claustrophobic, caustic sound with especially sharp guitar work, straddling the line between catchiness and dissonance more effectively than on previous songs to make it even more memorable. Abyss Unto Abyss reverts to the fast and furious elements that made A Door Never Closed such an impactful song, with leaner musicianship and biting vocals adopting a classic black metal formula. Jarring riffs and brief, energetic passages inject a fiercer edge, making room for expansive and atmospheric moments throughout, and allowing the underlying ambience that has been present throughout this album to take centre stage.
The Way Is The Grave, with its cinematic opening section that lends this song a ritualistic, primal feel, sets the tone extremely well before the hazy, reverb-drenched guitars finally kick in. This is a song that departs significantly from the tight and ferocious approach of the first five offerings, instead crafting a slow-burning, sombre sound built upon the crystalline guitars, rumbling drums and haunting vocals, all of which turn this into an immersive and grandiose piece of music that still has some of the meatier components of earlier tracks, but parting drastically from the established formula of this album, making this final song a more intriguing and interesting proposition to end on.
All Knots Untied emerged almost fully formed in terms of the band’s style when it came to the song-writing, and it was always going to be a tough album for NIXIL to follow up. But with From The Wound Spilled Forth Fire, the band have more than surpassed the excellence of their debut without having to alter many of their key tropes to do so. The vocals and guitar work especially possess that same dramatic and imaginative approach, but seem to be performed with more confidence here, with the lurch between jarring discordance and catchy, melodic leads feeling much more seamless, which in turn makes each of these six tracks a lot more engrossing as a result, never quite tipping over into experimental or avant-garde territories but similarly not acquiescing to the slick, punchy moments too much either. This is genuinely one of those albums that could appeal to a broad range of black metal fans, and with any luck this is a trend that is only set to continue with whatever NIXIL have in store next.
Rating: 9/10
From The Wound Spilled Forth Fire is out now via Prosthetic Records.
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