Review Summary: Quietly, without drawing too much attention, Crowpath continues to test the boundaries of heaviness.
Son of Sulphur, second album from Swedish band Crowpath, feels and sounds like total carnage. Picking up where
Red on Chrome left off, the band creates a more refined sound which is as brutal as that album was, but much more detailed and accomplished.
Son of Sulphur is a 30+ minutes collection of savage, brutal, violent and demolishing riffs, that create a overwhelming and evil atmosphere bordering on punishment. Crowpath have this accurate instinct for everything that is brutal, that it comes as a second nature: music sounds urgent and necessary. Music is indeed technical, but it's secondary to the primary target: to generate a sonic onslaught. Even monstrous
Red on Chrome can’t match it. And that’s something.
Album never loses steam. Most songs are fast paced, but they don't necessarily rely on speed. Even on slower songs like “The Lycanthrope”, album still sound crushing and menacing. Crowpath cares very little about variation or progression. Instead, the riffs are thoroughly worked, shifting enough to keep the songs from becoming stagnant or boring, maintaining the full impact. The sick, awesome, laser-cutting-metal riff on “Children of Boredom” suffices to bend anything in its wake, and the aforementioned “The Lycanthrope” has this haunting, hypnotic, repetitive riff carrying the song for almost five minutes without pushing it; but really every song features creative and notable riffs that deliver to the max. Closer “End in Water” deviates from the formula, with its odd, unexpected middle and end sections, which gives the listener a sense of relief, ending the album in an interesting and calming way.
Henrik Ivarsson’s harsher, less-angry-than-demonic vocals give the album a different feel this time. Drummer Erick Hall still does a pretty good job at providing the songs the punch they need, but is guitarist Patrik Lundh who unashamedly dominates the album, proving to be the band’s driving force. He always finds the exact riff and twist to make every song a standout, even when the whole album has a similar tone.
Granted, albums this dense can suffer from sounding all the same. The brutal atmosphere drowns the songs until they're undistinguishable, or simply, it's so heavy that you don't care for them at all. So it’s remarkable when a band can pull it off like this, without sounding gimmicky or generic. At almost 34 minutes, album ends before the impact is diluted and becomes annoying.
To my ears, this is pure, unadulterated grindcore. The album oozes raw energy and infectious vitality. Crowpath doesn’t try to rewrite the book of heaviness with this album (though scores higher than most bands do); instead it serves as a magnificent example of what can be accomplished in the genre. Steering away from the metalcore formula of their debut and having a different approach,
Son of Sulphur is a highly successful sophomore effort, establishing the band as one of the heaviest and finest around.
Aside from its brutal appeal,
Son of Sulphur will satisfy both lovers of creative and technical metal.
4.1/5
