Wolvennest - Procession - review
Wolvennest - Procession - review
Tracklist
01. Another Nail02. Purple Poison
03. The Shadow On Your Side
04. Damnation
05. Décharné
06. Things That Breathe Are Death
07. Burial
08. Famadihana
09. Hunters
10. Tarantism
11. The Last Chamber
A review by
musclassia October 29, 2025
The first two albums from the band, Void and Temple, both approached the classic 80-minute album limit, and used those minutes to engross listeners in walls of layered guitars, using extensive repetition and the sermonic vocals of Sharon Shazzula to craft dark sonic rituals. While The Dark Path To The Light was plenty enjoyable in its own right, it did dial down the occult and gothic rock elements to a degree, condensing the band’s style to go with the reduced runtime. Procession has a slightly expanded sonic range, particularly in how it descends into darkness across its infernal processional duration, but remains firmly recognizable as a Wolvennest album.
For the unfamiliar, the style of the band is doomy, at-times almost droning with the repetition, while incorporating elements of krautrock and black metal. The opening song “Another Nail” is surprisingly direct for the beginning of a Wolvennest record, quickly kicking into a mid-tempo rhythm accompanied by goth-tinged doomy riffs, with a nice guitar lead-accompanied chorus. The theremin makes interesting contributions after the chorus; I don’t know if it’s just that I’ve now seen the band live and have seen it used there, but I don’t remember noticing the theremin nearly as prominently on past releases as on Procession, where it regularly contributes to the soundscapes.
Another thing that caught my attention more than usual this time around is the lead guitar work; obviously with three guitarists, there’s room for lead guitar parts on top of the wall-of-sound foundation, but pretty much every song has a solo that is a highlight of the track, as well as compelling lead melodies and motifs that commonly form a call-and-response with Shazzula’s vocals. Standout solos include the two (one slower, one showier) in “Purple Poison”, the melodic solos in “Décharné” and “Hunters”, and the understated one in “Burial”.
Beyond the solos, the album has a somewhat consistent sound across the first few tracks. “The Shadow On Your Side” is more gothicky and up-tempo like the opener, while “Purple Poison” and “Damnation” have steadier rhythms (the latter after a prolonged ambient opening), but each has a similar occultish feel. The first departure of any note is “Décharné”, whose slower, grander feel is accentuated by pleasant lead guitar melodies accompanying the droning wall-of-sound guitar foundation and relatively tender delivery of the French lyrics.
After this comes the ambient spoken word interlude “Things That Breathe Are Death”, which feels like the turning point of the record, as the ‘side B’ that follows offers variety in darkness. The descent is gradual, as “Burial”, in spite of its organs, psychedelic aura and Western guitar twang, is no great departure; neither is “Famadihana”, in spite of the horror movie feel coming from the synths and backing vocals, but there is a dark tone to it, and the more prominent tremolo guitar approach is a prelude to the real shock that comes with “Hunters”. Wolvennest have often been said to have a blackened sound, but this is the first time (to me at least) that it sounds like they’re actually playing black metal, with very classically blackened tremolo riffing and sinister rasping harsh vocals. There’s no blast beats, and the track has a softer, cleaner mid-song detour, but it's a fascinating new sound from the band.
I’m not sure who performs the harsh vocals on this album; the previous record had Misþyrming’s D. G. handling those duties, but here my guess is Shazzula, and they’re a very impressive addition to her commanding clean vocals if so. There is a guest vocal appearance on Procession, but of a very different form; “Tarantism” is unique in a distinct way to “Hunters”, in that it is very loose structurally and atmosphere-oriented, lacking much at all in the way of concrete rhythm as Adaestuo’s Hekte Zaren operatically sings and moans. The performance is almost Diamanda Galás-esque, with warbling theremin, stripped-down motifs, sparse drum hits and gradually creeping guitar distortion as accompaniment instead of piano.
These two wildcards set the stage perfectly for the immense album closer “The Last Chamber”, whose opening clean guitar motif eventually gets turned into its main riff, a somewhat more structured and melodic one than the usual wall-of-sound. There’s a really compelling Eastern-influenced atmosphere to the track, and the harsh vocals from “Hunters” return in the chorus, delivered in some style. After the second chorus, the song pulls back for a tom-driven atmospheric build that eventually leads into the album’s final stellar solo, a bridge to a really intense and gripping climactic clean vocal passage, the immense soundscape of which ultimately fades out into apocalyptic nothingness.
Even with the surprise cuts here, I’m not sure Procession quite has the same all-round range and standout songs of Temple, which remains my favourite release from the band. Nevertheless, it is another richly textured and deftly assembled spiritual journey from one of the modern masters of atmosphere in metal.
Written on 29.10.2025 by
Written on 29.10.2025 by
Hey chief let's talk why not Comments
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I completely agree with your review. As you said, it does feel like a turning point midway, "as the ‘side B’ that follows offers variety in darkness." In particular, tracks like Famadihana really stood out to me because they felt more like the classics from Temple. The first tracks, such as Another Nail and The Shadow on Your Side didn't really resonate with me, but I still enjoy them. Going to see the band tonight in Hamburg, I'm sure it's going to be a blast (again).
---- That rug really tied the room together, did it not? 
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Posts: 8642 Written by TheBigRossowski on 30.10.2025 at 10:50 Enjoy, I'm jealous! Loved them at a festival in London last year, hope they come back to UK soon
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