A sort of indescribable slab of metallic greatness, Black Royal’s Lightbringer truly is a bringer of light in these dark times.
If we were looking to throw out some descriptor’s, though: Finnish death ‘n’ roll in the vein of Entombed’s post-Wolverine Blues offerings with echoes of Boston’s own Motherboar. And that’s all we’re doing on the comparison front.
But I digress.
“Cryo-Volcanic” is a fucking beast with its’ concentrated attacks, intended breaks and time changes until ending with the solo pangs of Pete’s bass, which previously in the track rumbled like the tremors that herald an oncoming earthquake. Like those tremors, “Cryo-Volcanic” also heralds what’s soon to blast out your ear holes.
Like “Self-Worship”, coming at you like one of those aforementioned latter-day Entombed jams with Toni’s squealing guitars and these raucous piano lines that seemingly come from out of nowhere. Or like “Salvation” which is anything but as this sinister Doom track lurches into a riff-filled swamp with Riku’s growl relentlessly adding a gruff edge.
“Denial”, on the other hand, just rips and roars out of the gates with a fury until “Pentagram Doctrine” goes right back into the murky sludge. The title track just blasts full force out of your speakers next with an unbridled intensity as Riku’s maw brings the ruckus and Toni’s guitars create a wall of sound.
“New World Order” is the first one here (And at nine tracks in even!) that even remotely slows everything down and even still Jukka’s persistent pummeling launches this one above the rest until “Ou[t]roboros” (Can we also just take a minute to acknowledge how ingenious the song title alone is???) wraps up Lightbringer in a subtle yet fitting manner without the bombast, but no less driven.
Lightbringer illuminates your earholes on March 9th through Suicide Records. Yours can be gotten by clicking here. For more on Black Royal, head on over here.