BAD OMEN
With their fourth album, tunic-clad Lancastrians Wytch Hazel made one of the best records of 2023 and 1983. IV: Sacrament felt like a visitor from a vanished age, one that placed a premium on the genre’s most traditional values: rich, melodic songs and soaring harmonic guitars. But this was no Campaign For Real Metal throwback; songs such as Angel Of Light and AThousand Years were a battleground between mainman Colin Hendra’s Christian beliefs and a cruel, unforgiving modern world.