The members of Vhöl come from well-established metal bands – Agalloch, a post metal outfit; Hammers of Misfortune, a progressive metal band; and Yob, a doom metal band. Vhöl is none of these. Labeled as black metal blended with old school thrash metal, Vhöl manages to combine elements of its members’ former bands into one big progressive blackened thrashy delight. “The Wall” starts out of the gate with a fury reminiscent of 90’s industrial metal. Guitar leads flirt with middle Eastern scales and modes. “Insane With Faith” keeps the album in high gear, this time demonstrating their blend of traditional old-school thrash with black metal. This song, along with “Plastic Shaman,” are best representative of what’s at the core of this band. The rest of the songs use this base as a starting point and branch out to other areas of metal. I willingly admit I’m not the biggest fan of black metal; if I listen to it for too long the songs start to run together. If you’re not paying attention, this might happen to you during this album. For me, there was enough variation in the standard formula to keep me hanging on. Songs such as “Grace” or “Set to Await Forever” dabble in major chord progressions, which is a polarizing issue in certain metal circles.

One issue I had personally with the album is the production. Phil Spector created in the 60s a production value called the “Wall of Sound,” a dense, full, thick, and multilayered sound. I like to think that Vhöl has a vault door of sound. The guitars are so distorted and so full of reverb that it knocks you over but you still don’t know what hit you. Individual parts are difficult to discern. However, that’s the point. Black metal is one of the sub-genres of metal that is more concerned with atmosphere and chord progressions than with rhythms, grooves and riffs.

Songs like “Arising,” though, are why I made it all the way through the album. The riff that kicks in thirty seconds into the song is one of those riffs that make you want to break a beer bottle against a table and punch your neighbor in the gut. It’s groovy. It’s fantastic. It’s another great example of the blending that Vhöl has mastered on this album.

-ZS