Incantation: From Golgotha to Elysium – The Victorious March of Incantation
It’s easy to fall into the trap of seeing genre-movements as a solely geographical occurrence. Geography is important, sure – Norwegian black metal, Swedish death metal and German thrash all carry a very distinct sound – but it isn’t everything. In the 90s when death metal was booming in Florida, you couldn’t walk around Tampa without tripping over a gore-drenched piece of sonic brutality. But American death metal reached further than Tampa Bay. On the North East coast, led by sole remaining original member John McEntee, INCANTATION were as far removed from the Tampa scene sonically as they were geographically.
“When we started, we were considered the bastard child of death metal because we were doing things differently from bands like OBITUARY, MORBID ANGEL, DEICIDE etc. They’re all great bands, but we wanted to do something that was distinctively us.” McEntee reflects on the early work of INCANTATION, and how different the band were to the big bands in death metal at the time. “I’ve always been a metal fanatic, and I loved the demo tape trading days of the 80s. With INCANTATION I wanted to use those inspirations from a lot of different underground bands. I love that raw edge where it’s aggressive as fuck, but I wanted to do something taking these influences but in a way that was unique. Without even knowing it, we created our own niche of death metal.”
That’s a very humble way to describe INCANTATION’s brand of sonic brutalisation. The super raw, super brutal, highly dissonant blend of funeral doom, classic death metal and black metal may have been on the extreme side of extreme metal in the 90s but as the 2010s have turned into the 2020s their sound has never been more relevant. The new wave of old-school death metal has been in full swing for the better part of a decade now with bands like GATECREEPER, TOMB MOLD and BLOOD INCANTATION all topping the genre, and all citing INCANTATION as one of their key influences. But have McEntee and co felt a knock on effect from the recent popularisation of bands who draw upon their unique niche?
“It’s fair to say we’ve felt a boost from that for sure. The fact that there is a new generation that is inspired by what we did in the past and what we’re currently doing is an amazing thing that I never thought would happen. We never planned on being an influential band, we always just wanted to do things our way and we never looked at ourselves as paving the way for new bands, but it’s an extreme honour as a songwriter to have other bands take influence in your sound.” McEntee says, considering the legacy of INCANTATION and their impact on the new wave of old-school death metal – and in turn, the new wave of old-school death metal’s impact on INCANTATION.
“Of course, as far as our popularity is concerned it definitely helps. There’s a lot of really great bands who are influenced by us. We didn’t feel much of our popularity being fueled by new bands in the early 2000s but in the last ten years, definitely. There’s a lot of younger fans getting into us, and it’s great to see that some bands who are influenced by us are doing really well. It’s awesome to know that in an indirect way, or maybe even a direct way, we’ve had an impact on the death metal scene. Especially going from people not really giving us the time of day as we were too different in the early days to now, where our style is now one of the standard styles of death metal.”
But it would be a great disservice to McEntee and the rest of INCANTATION to suggest that the newfound success of the band is merely down to legacy-worship from a new generation. While that almost certainly plays a role, the fact is the last decade has seen the band release some of their strongest material of their career with 2014’s Dirges of Elysium and especially this year’s Sect of Vile Divinities easily holding their own against the classics like Onward to Golgotha and Mortal Throne of Nazarene.
“I never would have thought so late in my career that things would be going so much better than they have ever been. We did quite well at different times throughout the years but it just seems like there’s a synergy in the air. We’re all so inspired to write and play, the overall vibe is just so positive and we’re all feeling super ambitious.”
The inspiration and ambition running through the INCANTATION camp is abundantly clear with new record, Sect of Vile Divinities. Arguably the band’s strongest album of the 21st century, the band have struck back after a middling response to 2018’s Profane Nexus to deliver something incredible. Unified by a general theme tying together the majority of the lyrics and the artwork, lyricist and bassist Chuck Sherwood has truly outdone himself this time around.
“It’s tough for me to explain the concept of the record because Chuck’s lyrics are so complex,” McEntee begins. “But basically the majority of the songs are individual songs about different deities throughout time and different folklore, different religious stories. I know what the songs are talking about, but I can’t give explanations with the proper articulation that Chuck can… It’s pretty fascinating, we’re super lucky to have such a great lyricist in the band.”
Fortunately, Sherwood is more than happy to offer a more detailed dive into the lyrical themes and concepts. Generally speaking, Sect of Vile Divinities is an exercise in exploration of relatively evil mythological figures – but there’s few broadly known names and tales to be heard here. No stories of Thor and Jormungandr, Tyr and Fenris, nothing on Zeus and Prometheus and the Olympians.
“For the better part of the earlier creations in death metal, lyrics were mostly about Satan. That was a draw, sure, but I’d like to turn people’s minds a bit.” Sherwood explains initially on the loose inspiration behind his lyricism. “When I was a kid listening to IRON MAIDEN’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner I had no idea it was based on the Samuel Coleridge poem – the song served as an introduction to me. I’m trying to create that desire, we’re taking you on a journey to learn about some interesting, fucked up history.”
And there’s plenty of introductions to be made across Sect of Vile Divinities. Be it ancient spells to ward off the Mesopotamian demon Lamashtu (Ritual Impurity (Seven of the Sky Is One)), tales of ancient Canaanite acts of child sacrifice to the God Moloch (Propitiation), an ancient Balian legend of witchcraft (Entrails of the Hag Queen) or a retelling of a subtle myth from Japanese and Taoist mythology (Shadow-Blade Masters of Tempest and Maelstrom) for fans of lyrics and the stories behind them there is plenty to dig into here. There’s even a compulsory song raging against the three Abrahamic religions in the form of Fury’s Manifesto. “We want to make sure we don’t discriminate against what religions we hate,” McEntee comments wryly. Perhaps most interesting, though, is the semi self-referential Chant of Formless Dread.
“This was an interpretation of an Egyptian curse that was found in papyrus with mummy wrappings, as far as I recall.” Sherwood explains. “It’s also reflecting on the very meaning of INCANTATION, so to speak – we are creating this formless dread through our music.”
All this is barely scratching the surface of Sect of Vile Divinities. But after creating their strongest album in decades, with their most complex conceptual basis to date, are McEntee and Sherwood taking some time to relax with touring suspended and the new album about to drop?
Absolutely not. “I had the lyrics for the next INCANTATION album written about a year ago, so what I’m writing just now isn’t for the next album, it’s for the album that will follow that. I’ve been listening to a lot of Audiobooks about Ancient Rome. It’s a direction I think would be incredibly interesting for INCANTATION, as it’s an area we’ve never really delved into before.” Sherwood says, remarkably nonchalant about already writing for INCANTATION’s 14th album weeks before the 12th is scheduled to release. And McEntee echoes these workaholic comments.
“We already have a lot of material for the next album sorted already. When we finished the mixing for Sect of Vile Divinities I was still so inspired to write, almost in an answer to what we did with Sect. We’ll probably be finished writing our 13th album by the end of the year, and try to record it as soon as we get the opportunity.”
It’s clear talking to both McEntee and Sherwood that INCANTATION are in a stronger position now than ever before. On the cusp of releasing one of the best albums of their entire career, with a follow up already almost ready and work beginning on the next album after that, INCANTATION’s victorious march goes ever onward.
Sect of Vile Divinities is out now via Relapse Records.
Like INCANTATION on Facebook.