Dread Sovereign – ‘Alchemical Warfare’ (Metal Blade)

By Monk

Alan Averill – or Nemtheanga, to give him his perhaps more recognizable stage name – bestrides the Irish death metal scene like a colossus, having been single-handedly responsible (especially in his own eyes) for placing the Emerald Isle’s contribution to the genre firmly and squarely in the centre of the global stage. He is also a man possessed of an ego as big as the Irish diaspora, not least in his derogatory attitude towards the Irish music media (which is perhaps surprising considering his own background as a journalist of some repute) … so, he won’t really give a flying fuck what we north of the border at ÜRHQ make of this, the third full-length offering from his doomier side project, will he (something he makes clear in the title of the closing track? Well, fuck him, ‘cos we’re gonna tell him, and you, anyway…

Since the band’s inception a decade ago, Dread Sovereign has seen Averill pulling double duty, butchering (to use his own PR’s words) the bass in addition to dominating the microphone in his own vicious, visceral style. DS bear several similarities to Averill’s main project, Primordial, not the least of which is his distinctive vocal style. Neither are both bands the most prolific on the recording front – a factor not helped by the fact that all three DS members live in different countries. And, lyrically, they follow similar thematic territory, albeit with DS somewhat more straightforward in their approach to delivering Averill’s message of impending apocalypse – one accentuated by the background against which this, the latest of the band’s conceptually-intertwined full-lengthers, is released.

Now, from my comments above, you might assume that I am going to get absolutely ripped into this band and this album. So, let’s get this straight: I don’t like Averill as a person. I do not like his holier-than-thou approach to the music media, especially in his native land. But – no make that BUT – he is just one of a legion of arrogant, self-centred pricks I have encountered in my 30+ year career in this hoary old rock ‘n’ roll circus, and I have always been a big fan of Primordial and their music: proof that objectivity can over-ride personal differences when it comes to the most important aspect of the relationship between an artist and their fanbase – the actual product and how it is delivered.

So, having got all that off my chest, let’s get wired into the nitty-gritty of ‘Alchemical Warfare’, shall we? And, the truth is that it is a very impressive, highly accomplished album and an exemplar of old-school classic metal-inflected doom brought kicking and screaming into the 21^st Century and proving that the form is still very much a vibrant and energetic artform in its own right.

Certainly, ‘Alchemical Warfare’ displays all the traditional doom metal tropes: huge, Sabbathian bass lines; long, tangential instrumental passages; sparse melodies; ethereal atmospherics intertwined around thick, sludgy riffs dredged from the sleech beds of the Liffey and slagged all over Ireland’s green and pleasant land with unabandoned joy. Averill’s vocals are suitably acidic and volatile as he spits his lyrics with the venom of an uncoiling asp, while Bones’ guitar work is as cutting as a cut-throat razor through a 15-year old’s exposed jugular.

If you like your doom very much in the vein (sic) of traditionalists such as St Vitus, Candlemass and their ilk, you will find plenty to salivate over in the grooves of ‘AW’. It’s also an album which will very much appeal to Primordial fans, as it shares many of that band’s darker, more eerily introspective recesses. It is a considered, measured and accomplished addition to the doom canon, and certainly lays down a marker for the genre in what is already proving to be another problematic year for the music industry. It certainly is an album which I will willingly revisit and immerse myself in, certainly in my more morbid moods.

‘Alchemical Warfare’ is out now. You can get your copy HERE.

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