Exclusive Track Premiere: Devenial Verdict’s “Cold Lantern”
The warmth of a freezing afterglow.
Back in January, I drew a comparison between Finland’s Devenial Verdict‘s “I Have Become the Sun” and Maere‘s “Think of Me as Fire,” noting that “both bands inject a dense sense of atmosphere into their disso-death, drawing things out and making things itchy and uncomfortable for the listener.” Little did we know that “I Have Become the Sun” would be the opening track for Devenial Verdict’s forthcoming LP Blessing of Despair, out October 4 on the inimitable Transcending Obscurity Records. Since then, we’ve been treated to “Garden of Eyes” and “Moon-Starved,” two tracks that further demonstrate Devenial Verdict’s unique knack for unpredictable genre-bending. “Garden of Eyes” starts with a blistering scalar triplet-torrent before switching up into a Gateways-esque proclamation of deafening authority. We’re firmly embedded in Morbid Angel and Saevus Finis territory, until we abruptly drop into—and then out of—something quieter, safer, more somber, more spacious. “Moon-Starved” is a crepuscular and muscular mix of Ulcerate‘s dissonance and gothic darkness, layering clean, whispered, growled, and bellowed vocals on top of one another in a cacophony of tortured and damned souls, all aswirl in tendrillar riffing that isn’t so much heavy as it is weighty. After a surprisingly doom-laden passage of mourning solos, we’re befuddled once again by the shrill tonality and black metal hyperblasts that escort us to the track’s end.
None of that, really, can prepare you fully for “Cold Lantern,” the 4th and final single from Blessing of Despair. To be sure, aspects of the above songs are present, ensuring we can trace a narrative cohesion in the band’s sound, but “Cold Lantern” is, also like its predecessors, a composition unto itself. Buttressed by the addition of synths, the steady clip of Okko Tolvanen’s and Antti Poutanen’s rhythm section undergird Sebastian Frigren’s guitar play, forming some kind of bastardized Botch-by-way-of-Neurosis post-dissonance. This is all made the more substantial by Riku Saressalo’s whispers, croaks, and bawls that fit perfectly alongside Misery Index‘s Jason Netherton’s Daniel Tardy-like roar. The duo’s vocals nearly break at repeated moments in “Cold Lantern,” an unseemly unseaming of the threadbare reality in which Devenial Verdict has cloaked us. The Finnish lads are at their oddest and most obtuse on “Cold Lantern” while also betraying a kind of affective sensitivity that makes the staggering calamity all the more heartrending. Indeed, “nothing here remains.”
About the track, the band has this to say:
‘Cold Lantern’ is the epitome of lurching, malevolent sounds of our brand of crushing death metal—the chugging riffs, the booming bass, brutal drumming in combination with the croaking vocals truly create a soundscape of bleak horrors. This song also features guest vocals from the one and only Jason Netherton and they really add to the auditory nightmare that is ‘Cold Lantern.’
Blessing of Despair arrives October 4
on Transcending Obscurity Records.
Gaze upon Mariusz Lewandowski’s melancholic beauty.
Order the album and the merch and everything else.
