Flush It Friday: The Surprise Sargeist Edition
It is the weekend. Come shitpost, come flush, come jam.
As some of you may already have noticed, Sargeist, one of the best known Finnish black metal bands suddenly dropped their 5th full-length – Unbound – on W.T.C yesterday without prior announcement. A tactic that seems to become more and more popular, especially among established artists who don’t require the benefits of a longer, pre-release promotion period. The unannounced album has very much been looked forward to, not only because Feeding the Crawling Shadows came out over four years ago, but also because the preceding years have been rather tumultuous in the Sargeist camp. Shortly after FtCS, band-leader Shatraug, who had been performing live duties in Nightbringer, asked it’s guitarist VJS to join Sargeist for their first ever two-guitar line-up. After only one gig, however, the band dissolved as Vainaja, who’d also serve as Horna’s decade long rhythm keeper, vacated both seats and Hoath & Horns decided to solely focus on Behexen from now on, whereas Shatraug announced his departure said band. The next news were of a new line-up, assembled in 2016 from Saturnian Mist’s bassist, Abysmal, drummer Gruft from Perdition Winds and the prolific Profundus, known both as a drummer (Urn) and vocalist (The Crescent, Lord of Pagathorn) for it’s mouthpiece – most curious detail being that the latter-most two serve as Desolate Shrine’s dual vocalists. Of course, such details mean little beyond the members’ capability of carrying a tune, and there never was fear that whoever Shatraug’s choice was, would be inadequate for the position.
Despite the very significant changes in the line-up, Sargeist’s sound remains as unyielding as ever. There’s never been the same distinction between different eras as Shatraug’s main gig, Horna has, but every album has seen Sargeist approach their sound from a slightly different angle. Unbound’s differences would mainly seem to stem from it’s line-up, the ice-cold melodies and poignant songwriting that influenced countless others are very much in place, albeit the melancholy that permeated the band’s work until Let The Devil In, does not make a return appearance. Profundus’ vocal-work seeks an angle of desperation that wasn’t there before and the atmosphere is more grimy than spectral, topped with Henri “Trollhorn” Sorvali’s clear but adequately raw mix. “Blessing of The Fire-Bearer”, as far as I know, the first Sargeist song not to be penned by Shatraug, sounds like it belongs, even though long time fans and followers of Shatraug’s work might recognize other hands at play, and becomes one of the album’s highlighting moments. naturally, I haven’t had much time to familiarize myself with the record, so possible further weighing of it’s material must be left for an undisclosed date. I just wish the artwork wasn’t as… that. For now, enjoy the record as you shitpost away.
But first, let’s take a look at this week’s highlights!
We got the scoop on Azusa
Began The Great Junji Ito Read-Off
Spoke with Andrew from Baring Teeth
Reminisced that time Nergal witnessed a possible sexual assault and didn’t give a damn, as well as found out he’s pretty much willing to take any excuse to defend any wife-beating, harassing scumbag – all by reading his biography.
And premiered a whole lot of the good stuff, including, but not limited to: tech death from Serocs
Black metal by Esoctrilihum
And death/grind by Languish
Witness “The Blinding Light of Purgatory” in Just Over A Minute!
The stage is yours
