Review Summary: An old phantom appeared.
I went into Escumergament’s latest album,
Apparebat Eidolon Senex, expecting a relatively straightforward atmospheric black metal experience. The opening riffs of “Within the Inner” seemed to prove that assumption as the driving tremolos and subtle synth let me easily sink into familiar planes. But already by the end of the track, right when the synths start going all Pan’s Labyrinth, I started to question whether I’d judged this record too soon.
Labyrinthine is a good descriptor for
Apparebat Eidolon Senex. Crafted by an anonymous crew of musicians pulled from several other Swedish black metal bands, it’s clear that the minds behind Escumergament knew what they were doing. This album is loaded with synths, frigid second-wave riffing and strange crawling segments. It rarely sounds outright sinister, leaning instead into the odd and bewildering. It’s an album that beckons the listener deeper. Like standing inside the maze and hearing synths echoing from one direction while spindling guitar riffs float from the other. The sound is raw and pummeling with influences pulled from atmospheric acts and 90s symphonic black metal, although the synths are often pared down and typically used as foundation instead of taking the limelight – although not always (see: “To the Graves!”). The buzzsaw guitar riffs handily shift from the traditional and melodic (“Within the Inner,” “Radiant Glimmering Whorl”) to the avant-garde and dissonant (“Laudanum and a Silver Scalpel,” “The Eyeless Festering God”). The vocals are what you’d expect from a raw black metal outing and they’re solid and befitting, if not particularly noteworthy.
This might all sound fairly standard on paper, but what makes
Apparebat Eidolon Senex really stand out is the overwhelming and singularly consuming atmosphere. And not atmospheric in the way you're probably thinking. What I’d expected on first brush to be straightforward atmoblack ended up being something far stranger. It’s a record packed with cunning musical subversion and an engrossing attention to detail. It simultaneously sounds raw and meticulously considered. At times the record feels medieval, esoteric and disorienting at others, ancient and otherworldly. Like the listener is trespassing in forbidden realms. In short, it rules. Give this album a shot.
