Abigail Williams - Walk Beyond The Dark - review
Abigail Williams - Walk Beyond The Dark - review
Band
Abigail Williams Album
Walk Beyond The Dark Style
Atmospheric black metal Release date
November 15, 2019 Tracklist
01. I Will Depart02. Sun And Moon
03. Ever So Bold
04. Black Waves
05. Into The Sleep
06. Born Of Nothing
07. The Final Failure
A review by
musclassia November 17, 2019
When I first discovered Abigail Williams, they had Legend and In The Shadows Of A Thousand Suns under their belt, the former an EP that if pressed I would describe as 'blackcore', and the latter a symphonic black metal album in the vein of Cradle Of Filth. This decade, they've since dabbled with meloblack (In The Absence Of Light) and atmospheric black (Becoming), and whilst I hugely enjoy both of these records, the band has received fair criticism for lacking a clear identity (or, more harshly, for being bandwagon jumpers). 2015's The Accuser, a harsh, somewhat psychedelic album, was another stylistic jump, but felt more like a band searching for its own distinctive voice. Now, after a 4-year gap that involved frontman Ken Sorceron joining (and in the latter case, subsequently quitting) Lord Mantis and The Faceless, Walk Beyond The Dark has arrived, and it feels like the culmination of a decade-long search to find the 'real' Abigail Williams.
Walk Beyond The Dark takes aspects of the various different faces Abigail Williams have worn this decade, but delivers its own distinctive sound. "I Will Depart" is, if anything, closest to In The Absence Of Light, a measured, semi-melodic opener that is willing to unleash the blast beats, but which is less reliant on them than the at times overwhelming The Accuser. This song offers up some memorable riffs to get the neck moving, such as the rolling groove during which the song title is shrieked, and conjures a general ominous sense of impending peril, really announcing right off the bat how vital this latest incarnation of the band is. The closing moments of this song also reveal a new feature this time around; clean vocals, which unless my memory is failing me haven't previously popped up in any of the band's previous work. In this first instance, they are only wordless chants, but the next song, "Sun And Moon", features actual singing, and whilst Abigail Williams aren't going to redefine clean black metal vocals, they fit nicely into and enhance the songs in which they feature.
The frantic verses of "Sun And Moon" are amongst the moments on Walk Beyond The Dark that feel closest to The Accuser, but the tom-driven midsection of this song takes the song in a different direction, and the combination of cello with black metal tremolo is more reminiscent of the use of violin on Becoming. "Sun And Moon" is also one of the shorter songs on Walk Beyond The Dark, which features two tracks that break the 10-minute mark. These two songs, "Black Waves" and "The Final Failure", are arguably the standout cuts from the record. "Black Waves" opens with some sombre cello before segueing into a delicate clean guitar section, almost feeling like it could've been part of a metal version of a Lord Of The Rings soundtrack. This eventually gives way to heavier sounds, but the whole song is a carefully executed atmos-black epic featuring a captivatingly gloomy clean vocal midsection, a mesmerizing synthesis of black metal, sorrowful voices and tastefully integrated cello. "The Final Failure", on the other hand, is the closest the band gets to the string-dominated atmos-black of Becoming, and offers the most accomplished infusion of violins/cello and black metal delivered on Walk Beyond The Dark. Compared to the uplifting tone of the similarly string-dominated "Into The Sleep", this is morose and pessimistic, a proper successor to the awesome "Beyond The Veil" from Becoming, and yet it finds the time to fit in an unexpected but satisfying guitar solo, a rarity for the band.
Whether Walk Beyond The Dark is the best work of Abigail Williams is up for debate; however, this is the album of theirs that most feels like it represents the band's vision, combining the strings and atmosphere of Becoming, the aggression of The Accuser and the meloblack riffing of In The Absence Of Light to deliver something that sounds truly their own, rather than an homage to Wolves In The Throne Room or Cradle Of Filth. It may be that the next Abigail Williams album will be yet another big departure, but if there was ever a time to focus on refining a sound rather than completely replacing it, this seems as good a time as any.
Rating breakdown
| Performance: | 8 |
| Songwriting: | 9 |
| Originality: | 7 |
| Production: | 8 |
Written on 17.11.2019 by
Written on 17.11.2019 by
Hey chief let's talk why not Comments
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Posts: 9624
This is one of the best redemption arcs in music
---- Do you think if the heart keeps on shrinking One day there will be no heart at all?
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Posts: 8656 Written by RaduP on 17.11.2019 at 17:58 If their career went in the opposite direction they would be considered the worst sellouts, it's an interesting path they've taken. To be fair, I've enjoyed every step along the way, although I lost interest in their stuff from last decade a while ago.
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Posts: 8656 Written by Coconut Racecar on 17.11.2019 at 22:20 I discovered them Summer 2010 - a friend from high school dumped a load of music from his hard drive onto my computer before we left for Uni. This was whilst I was in the early stages of getting into metal - as far as extreme metal went, I knew Opeth, metalcore and Gothenburg bands, and that was about it. So running through the music alphabetically, the first song on there was The World Beyond by Abigail Williams - that instant flamboyant tremolo and shrieking was completely alien to me and hooked me immediately. I was actually rather keen on that album fairly early on, enough so that I bought In The Absence Of Light when I saw the CD in HMV a couple of months later. It's been a long time since I've listened to In The Shadows..., but I've consistently returned to In The Absence.. and subsequently Becoming throughout the decade, and it's been really cool seeing the band that was really my first black metal band evolve in the way they have, particularly as those first few albums came out/came to my attention at just about the right moments in my descent into more extreme metal so that I was in a position to appreciate them; if later Abigail Williams (e.g. The Accuser) had been what I heard in 2010, I'm not sure it would have appealed to me in the same way, as it was less melodic and dramatic. In that case, I may never have cared enough to track their subsequent releases, particularly seeing as none of them have really received the kind of acclaim and attention that may have persuaded me to retry them, which would have meant I missed out on the likes of Final Destiny Of The Gods and Beyond The Veil, key black metal songs for me this decade.
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Posts: 545  |
Posts: 545
Pretty much sums up this album and Abigail Williams in general, good job! This is probably the album I enjoyed most by them, and I don't mind the stylistic jumps either. Looking forward to what they come up with next.
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| The Witchfinder
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Posts: 9624 Written by [user id=220667] on 19.11.2019 at 00:02 yay
---- Do you think if the heart keeps on shrinking One day there will be no heart at all?
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"This album is downloadable for free - as we do not want pirates to profit from this music. Please donate as you see fit if you enjoy the music." https://blood-music.bandcamp.com/album/walk-beyond-the-dark
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Posts: 435  |
Posts: 435
I didn't get into them until 'Becoming', which I really, really loved. It was the first atmospheric black metal album that hooked me and I've probably listened to the song Beyond the Veil over 40 times. With the release of 'The Accuser' they became one of my favorite bands, and this new release only solidifies that. I like their earlier stuff, but these last three albums are staples I continually return to.
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Posts: 8656 Written by Lord Slothrop on 21.11.2019 at 08:06 I probably prefer In The Absence Of Light to The Accuser - a bit hookier I guess, and the arpeggios at the end of Final Destiny Of The Gods are euphoric, but yeah Beyond The Veil is their masterpiece
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