When it comes to extreme music from Italy, you can expect it to be the epitome of that very word. It doesn’t matter if it is death metal, black metal or grind….the Italians know how to create some fine heavy music. This time around, it’s a black metal band known as Darkend. Their third full length album, The Canticle of Shadows, is the Fleshgod Apocalypse of their genre. Savage musicianship, layers of sound and instrumentation and foul screams cast out to shatter your skull. Darkend is a band you need to be listening to.
Darkend’s conjuring of black metal magic on The Canticle of Shadows is an enjoyable one. They take what Carach Angren and Cradle of Filth have been doing and honestly put a genuine dark twist on it. The blackened melodies from Ashes’ and Nothingness’ guitars pour out on every single track. Their tone they use isn’t traditional black metal nor is it dumbed down modern production. Their musicianship on the song writing is good, as they can lay down harsh power chords, melodies and tremolo pick at great speeds. Valentz’ drum performance coincides with the guitars perfectly. If the guitars are fiery, you bet your ass the drum speeds will be as well. Expect a lot of blast beats on this effort.
Animæ’s vocal work is wonderful, he doesn’t have a lower growl as he uses his throaty mid ranged screams to get his point across on these songs. Every once in a while though he will screech with a higher registered pitch of screams. Not identical to Filth, but vaguely familiar. Specter’s bass work lays down the evil law and rhythms with the guitars. Expect him to do nothing extraordinary, as his mission is just to get the music to pop out more with various power on a lower registry. Antarktica’s keyboard performance is more flowing with the rest of the instruments, it never swells over the rest of the band nor does the band rely on the atmospheric blasphemy coming out of Antarktica’s fingers. Without the keys though, Darkend loses a major element in their sound. The Canticle of Shadows benefits from it and honestly, I did too.
Darkend is a band that needs to be on your radar as it will remain on mine. The Canticle of Shadows is a wonderful surprise of modern symphonic black metal when the genre is honestly lacking greatness. Bands like this were everywhere 10+ years ago, but it seems everyone is either going depressive or ambient black metal these days, with few bands sticking with a traditional sound. Darkend fills the void of good symphonic black metal, experimenting with different instruments (like a saxophone!) and taking out the normalcy in song writing and performances. Darkend’s latest album, The Canticle of Shadows, is one you need to listen to. This is flying under the radar and more people need to know of this release! Listen to it now!
8.5 out of 10
http://www.darkend.it/
https://www.facebook.com/darkendofficial
http://darkend.bandcamp.com/album/the-canticle-of-shadows
The post Review: Darkend – The Canticle of Shadows appeared first on Headbang or GTFO.