Wednesday, October 24, 2018

Fórn - Rites of Despair (2018)

 

Fórn is a destructive force of misery slowly sweeping across the nation and consuming everything in its path. Submission will not save you - it only allow the inevitable to unfold sooner. On the full-length album "Rites of Despair" the band shows no capacity for mercy playing a brutal mixture of doom, death, and sludge violently stirred together and swallowed by a sea of gloomy anguish. Now tides are rising and the wretched swill is ready to devour all in its path. These songs roar slowly and dismally, with harrowing growled vocals and scathing riffs that make you feel like you're being crushed to death by a glacier. Rusty, melancholic leads emerge to wail over the tumultuous sounds of the undercurrent giving clear, agonizing melodies to latch on to. But for all of the album's cruelty and ruthlessness, it is by no means heavy-handed. Every third song is an atmospheric track (and there are plenty of similar moments in between) that will allow you to drown in a sense of emptiness and pain, feeling lost and alone for a few minutes before the extreme metal returns to grind you into dust. "Scrying Below the Wolf Moon" and "The Ancient Wisdom of Sorrow" are favorites of mine. Each finds a moment early on where they burst into visceral monsters and churn violently for a while, but then pause midway through for some quiet acoustic reflection burdened by woe - then pick the metal back up like they never stopped, now feeling even more forlorn than before. This is misery given a voice and you're going to want to hear all it has to say! -Brandon

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