EP REVIEW: Spectral Voyeurism – Horns & Hooves
HORNS & HOOVES may not be the most prolific band out there when it comes to putting out new material, but what little they have produced in the decade since their formation is genuinely different from almost everything else within the US, and indeed international, black metal underground. Ever since the release of their debut demo, 2016’s Consecrate The Marrow, it’s been evident that although the Brooklyn-based trio draw heavily from the genre’s second wave heyday, they are determined not to be defined by that era and its style, embracing elements of punk, thrash, rock and many more progressive flourishes to give their sound an energetic and unhinged edge. The band’s latest EP, Spectral Voyeurism, is another great offering, and a brilliant continuation of their debut album, the frenetic and adventurous I Am The Skel Messiah.
Pleromic Birth (Intro), with its cinematic and ambience-driven sound, is a great way to kick things off, feeling more distinct and effective than your average instrumental piece, immediately grabbing the listener’s attention and setting a sombre tone for what’s to come. Spectral Voyeurism proves to be an opaque but powerful slab of melodic blackened thrash with frenetic drums and clanging basslines clashing with the dizzying guitar work and acerbic vocals for attention. It’s clearly indebted to classic black metal, but adopts a more feral and lively sound than songs in this style tend to be. The way it’s mixed means that the various elements that make up its imposing bulk cut through, which only helps to make it sound even more energetic and diverse, proving to be an ambitious offering to start the record proper in incredibly strong fashion.
Shallow Blue (Hesitation) is a slightly longer and sharper sounding instrumental that makes more prominent use of keyboards and vibraphone to tinge this minimalistic effort with a dense, spacey quality, along with accompaniments from the bass, drums and guitars that lends this an air of a proggy 70s rock number. This makes it stand out for all the right reasons, once again making even the most fleeting pieces of music feel important to the overall feel of this record.
Waiting For Creation, the first of two sprawling monoliths that close this EP out, has perhaps the most “traditional” black metal sound, with buzzsaw hooks and frenetic drumming providing a brilliant backdrop for demented, shrieking vocals and equally animated leads. But this classic feel very quickly gives way to something much more eclectic, introducing elements of electronic music and sudden shifts in tempo and style that make this much more unpredictable, lurching from doom-laden crawls to rabid bursts of aggression quite abruptly, keeping the listener on their toes as it progresses, with the tortured, howling vocals following suit.
The final song, Dust, continues in a very similar vein, starting out with biting blackened rhythms before morphing into something decidedly more feral and unhinged, with blistering riffs, bellicose vocals and an epic undercurrent turning this closer into a visceral slab of experimental black metal that is every bit as grandiose as it is noxious, with this bombastic edge serving as an anchor around which the more progressive flourishes are expertly interwoven. This is the sort of track that, much like many on this record, features more variety in one song than there is on some albums, and it concludes proceedings on a note that’s just as inventive as the one it began on.
With a lot of bands that are performing black metal in a more experimental style, it’s clear that the black metal elements come first and foremost, with a few bizarre touches added to make it stand apart from the pack. Here, HORNS & HOOVES have opted to use black metal more as a musical base upon which a broader palate of influences is overlaid, managing to push this style into stranger and more vitriolic territory, without stripping away the rawer production to achieve this. It’s impressive just how much the band have managed to incorporate into such a short record that makes it feel so much more distinct from the vast majority of black metal, whilst crucially not sacrificing any of the aggression or intensity, and it’s a varied and imaginative formula that has and hopefully will continue to serve them well.
Rating: 9/10
Spectral Voyeurism is out now via Stygian Black Hand/Invictus Productions.
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