ALBUM REVIEW: Goddess – Slægt
SLÆGT may very well be one of the best examples of Danish black metal, and have earned their place at the forefront of the country’s small but vibrant scene. With three full-length albums and the criminally-underrated 2015 EP Beautiful And Damned practically ear-marking the band for international acclaim, they’ve seen their sound alter from a more traditional, melodic black metal approach in their early years to an impressive blend of black and heavy metal more recently, most notably with their last record The Wheel. The band’s latest album, and first for Century Media Records, Goddess, sees their sound develop even further, and serves as the best possible introduction to a much wider audience they could hope for.
The album opens with Deceived By An Amethyst, an incredibly dramatic opening gambit that combines dark heavy metal riffs with caustic, growling vocals, lending a bleak and foreboding sound to everything. It’s a great marriage between classic metal with some well placed, subtle blackened components providing an interesting take on a timeless formula. Kiss From A Knife proves to be an intense piece of music, bordering on chaotic at points, with lots of tight, focused moments punctuated by frenetic and rabid ones. The vocals remain the only constant, with harsh but steady barks interwoven with the whirlwind guitars, thunderous bass hooks and intricate drums, making for a song that perfectly captures the band’s more polished and contrasting unpredictability in equal measure.
Hunt Again is a much fiercer and headier affair, with monolithic, sludgy bass and drums serving as a great backdrop for soaring and imaginative guitars that jump from impressive shredding to slower, jarring passages that see the music lean more heavily towards a black metal sound without ever fully embracing it. This one offers a generous dose of traditional metal even during the song’s more aggressive moments, perfectly blending the two in a way that keeps this lengthy track engrossing and beguiling throughout.
Fealty, Thunder Whip possesses a great classic heavy metal feel, with a distinct off-kilter edge that makes it all the more intriguing. Razor sharp guitar work, peppered with some great melodic flourishes and a subtle but effective discordant undercurrent really elevates this track, keeping it firmly anchored within a tried and tested sound whilst playing with the established formula and adding the band’s own flavour into the mix. Stabat Bloody Stabat serves as a short but incredibly effective interlude that acts as a hypnotic and powerful break in the album, with the atmospheric approach making this a great prelude to the album’s closing number, Goddess.
This final track is a magnificent, cinematic piece of music that manages to bring together the opposing heavy and black metal elements within the band’s sound brilliantly. With its cavernous drumming, rumbling bass lines and adventurous and varied guitars, along with the ominous snarl of the vocals, it’s a track that’s easy to get drawn into. The guitar work on here is easily the best on the record, encompassing acoustic sections, crunching metal rhythms and genuinely hair-raising melodic leads that cut through the thicker undercurrent of the track and inject a plethora of grandiose and epic moments into the already fantastic and eclectic music.
Above all else, Goddess is the culmination of SLÆGT‘s musical metamorphosis that has been occurring since 2017, when the band began to introduce classic heavy metal influences into their music more prominently. On Domus Mysterium and The Wheel, it was clear that the band were fine-tuning the mix of black and heavy metal in their music, with each of these skewing more towards one style, while their 2019 EP Black Bombs added a great, ritualistic feel to the music. With Goddess, SLÆGT have done an excellent job of distilling all the best components of these three records and allowing them to coalesce in an effective and balanced way, whilst raising the band’s already outstanding musicianship to a new level to make it their most eclectic, and indeed impressive, output to date.
Rating: 9/10
Goddess is out now via Century Media Records.
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