Häxkapell – Om jordens blod och urgravens grepp

Band: Häxkapell
Album title: Om jordens blod och urgravens grepp
Label: Nordvis Produktion
Release date: January 17, 2025
Country: Sweden
Format reviewed: High-quality digital recording

The music of Häxkapells second full-length album Om jordens blod och urgravens grepp is as grand and intense as the title. Right from the start I feel the wind of the mountains and valleys in northern Scandinavia, earth and underground, and something timeless beyond. The whole production is spacious and tactile. Deep, layered, expanding from the core of clean vocals and melodic instruments into waves of distortion and reverberation echoing over vast landscapes.

The music is built up by guitar riffs and melodic passages played on acoustic instruments, inspired by Scandinavian folk music as well as atmospheric black metal. Layers of distorted guitars are interwoven with the textures of violin and viola, clean choir and deep male clean vocals, enclosing the listener. Sometimes an instrument takes over and a solo comes forward, telling small details of a bigger story.

The production is clean and smooth but still textured, alive. Clean vocals, clean guitar, violin, flute and distorted guitar solos are all allowed some imperfection, some unexpected turns bringing a sense of humanity into the atmosphere.

The style of the clean male vocals is unusual for black metal but adds depth, a low vibration like the C-string of a cello. It weighs the music down, and grounds it deep into the earth, while the choirs and acoustic instruments tend to lift and expand. There is an earthiness to these sounds. I can smell the bedrock and feel the thin layer of lean soil under my hands.

The harsh vocals are slow and epic, in sync with the melody or flowing over the arrangement in long airy screams. Spoken word happens on a couple of occasions. The spoken voice is female with a slight northern accent. I am no fan of spoken word, but if you absolutely need to use it this is the way to do it. The language and accent make the words feel like whispers in the wind from Mother Earth.

The only time I fall out of immersion is in the fully acoustic song Hem. It starts with a folk melody played by the flute, which goes well with the feeling of wind in the mountains. The structure, vocal style, and melody of the song, however, deviates from the epic feeling of the album. It takes the form of a singer-songwriter production, reminding me of earlier acts from Northern Sweden such as Norrlåtar and Euskefeurat. Focused on the clean male vocals, accompanied only by hand drum and minimal instrumentation, the performance is intimate and vulnerable. From flying over the mountains, I now get landed beside the vocalist by a slow campfire, darkness closing in around us. The story that was up to now epic and endless, about earth and powers beyond, is now so personal it is almost uncomfortable. As it ends and is followed by an epic upwards swirling violin melody, I feel relieved to be back on my own journey.

The epic flow continues to the end and expands further into almost jazzy solos in the final song. When the last notes ring out, I find myself longing to go back. I feel a calling from something that didn’t quite reach me, and I want to go back and search for it. I am also left with a vague sense of pain and grief. Memories of those actual mountains come to my mind with a feeling of longing, danger and loss, of dammed rivers and devastating wounds of mining.

Om Jordens blod och urgravens grepp is inspired by many genres and uses many unexpected elements. The result is surprisingly cohesive. Maybe the atmosphere would have been even more immersive if some of the elements had been saved for the next album, but I am not sure. Häxkapell is pushing boundaries, telling their story the way it needs to be told, and maybe be a bit of discomfort is necessary to bring challenge. 9/10 By Ask

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9/10  Epic Storm
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