Band:	Lord Goblin
Album:	Lord Goblin
Style:	Epic heavy metal, Power metal
Release date:	March 2024

01. Northern Skyline
02. The Wanderer
03. The Oracle
04. Freedom Rider
05. Thunderous Smite
06. Light Of A Black Sun, Pt. 1
07. Light Of A Black Sun, Pt. 2

How about some epic heavy/power metal with strong black metal sensibilities?

In the last couple of years, we have had a couple of noteworthy black metal bands branching out to power metal in the form of Stormkeep and Moonlight Sorcery, but I cannot remember having recently come across a power metal band incorporating black metal in their music. Triumpher came somewhat close to that description with their splendid debut album last year, but that was mostly a darker and more sinister version of Manowar and Virgin Steele. Lord Goblin, on the other hand, sound as if Marco Hietala dressed as Messiah Marcolin is fronting a ‘70s occult-leaning and Jethro Tull-loving collab between Dissection and Domine, playing songs that Primordial wrote, and practised in a studio with walls full of posters of Quorthon.

Lord Goblin’s debut EP, The Ordeal (2021), was a power metal release that was striving for epicness, but, despite its solid songwriting and execution, it didn’t do too much else to stand out from the pack. The self-titled debut LP, however, is quite an original piece of music, even when it sounds so traditional and classic. The music is often energetically black metal-ish with riffs sounding as if they were forged by arctic winds in northern darkness, with pounding blastbeats and thundering cymbals, and with anthemic choruses that you cannot help but sing along, cranking the epic-o-metre up to 11. The keyboards snake through to create a more mystical atmosphere, and the blend of all these elements makes for an authentic sound that goes hand in hand with some excellent songwriting.

Lord Goblin is an album set out to catch you unprepared from its very own stoner-doom cover art (fantastic work by <i>Hellish Maggot</i>), which is entirely deceiving in terms of what kind of music is hiding behind it. From the opening maelstrom, “Northern Skyline”, to the closing salvo that is the two-part “Light Of A Black Sun” the album has blackened guitar melodies to die for alongside arcane synths, soaring clean vocals that rip the sky in half, gorgeous solos, and drums that make the songs proggier, more aggressive, and more compelling.

I have rarely heard anyone make power metal as grandiose and as enthralling as this.

“Then, a black sun rose on high
A guide in a world of false light
Its power, beacon in the bright
A call to rise up in might”