WIEGEDOOD
There’s Always Blood At The End Of The Road
CENTURY MEDIA
Church Of Ra-inducted black metallers embrace the ethos of change
PRESS X2
CHANGE IS AFOOT in the Church Of Ra camp. First Amenra break from tradition by calling their last record De Doorn instead of the usual numbered Masses, and now affiliates Wiegedood have retired the De Doden Hebben Het Goed I-III moniker that adorned their first three albums in favour of the more ominous There’s Always Blood At The End Of The Road. It makes sense to present this fourth record as a new entity, as whilst not a complete reinvention, it certainly finds the trio branching out beyond the confines of their early work.
Each chapter of that initial trilogy seemed to follow a formula, and although Wiegedood found room to innovate within that formula and keep it fresh, this new album does away with it entirely, allowing the band to venture into even more dynamic and atmospheric territory. Now Will Always Be is a great example, broadening the band’s crisp, modern black metal sound out into a more hypnotic and darkly melodic dirge, complete with sinister Attila Csiharesque throat singing. Or there’s the way the unnervingly dissonant clean guitars of Wade transition into the blistering furore of Nuages, only to return during the song’s stuttering, uncharacteristically spacious finale.