THROAT Beyond the Devil's Shroud LP BLUE RED , PRE-ORDER [VINYL 12"]

POZYCJA POWINNA BYĆ DOSTĘPNA NA POCZĄTKU KWIETNIA !!!

Hailing from the always-vibrant Polish black metal scene, THROAT are miasmic morbidity personified. While so many of their domestic contemporaries honor the paradigmatic sounds of the Temple of the Fullmoon, THROAT instead mine a wider, wilder style of black metal that looks both east and south. Theirs is a clanging, crunching sound that variously nods to Necromantia, Mortuary Drape, Hungary's Tormentor, early Samael, and fellow Polish iconoclasts Cultes des Ghoules: catacombed, ancient, unsettling. They displayed as much on their New Flesh Nectar demo in 2020 on the esteemed Fallen Temple label and yet further on 2024's Blood Exaltation EP for PRIMITIVE REACTION.

Now THROAT conspire again with PRIMITIVE REACTION for their long-brewing debut album, Beyond the Devil's Shroud. Indeed, the title Beyond the Devil's Shroud is apt, for the power-trio venture deeper into the catacombs of their sound and, in turn, aim for the horrifyingly endless beyond. On first blush, THROAT sound both sharper and more atmospheric - due in no small part to the production, which ably balances reverberating clarity and dingy murk - and proceed to build dread landscapes with disarming patience. The epic title track beginning the album presages much of the delirium to follow: shapeshifting effortlessly from ghoulish stomp to snaking speed, and a hitherto-unexplored usage of FX layering, compounding that reverberating horror. As the next four songs follow ritualistic suit, Beyond the Devil's Shroud opens up to reveal a madness more akin to millennial Mütiilation than Cultes des Ghoules - but THROAT duly honor the medieval witchcraft of the latter, intensifying the rough 'n' tumbling edges of that band's earliest work. References or none, the album is a hypnotic-yet-harrowing experience. How far dare you step into this?