Finnish act Seal Of Beleth was formed in 2007 by vocalist / guitarist Jyrki Kostamo (he was part of the last Lathspell line-up), bassist / vocalist Aki ‘Grim666’ Klemm (who owns this label, Patologian Laboratorio Productions, and used to be part of Lathspell as well; besides he’s active in many other bands and projects, such as Oath, Hautakammio, Dead Girl 13, Grimirg, Kalmankantaja and many others; for some of them reviews have been written and posted, so there is no reason not to check it out! Hautakammio December 21st, Grimirg December 13th), and drummer M. Kallio. In 2013 they released a first full length album, called Slow Music For dead People (independently released), and now the trio returns with the sophomore and untitled full album, which consists of four lengthy compositions, clocking in between ten and fourteen minutes. The material was written and recorded over a period of a year and a half in Aki’s Patologian Laboratorio Studio.
What this trio brings is quite a timeless form of Doom Metal in general, focusing on the origins of trippy Stoner (Metal) especially, and injecting the whole with elements from Epic Doom, Funeral Doom, Sludge, Old School Doom-Death Metal and the likes. The massive approach exhales a specific pounding, abyssal sounds that might be comparable to the current Post-Hardcore ‘hype’ (the description ‘hype’ is way too negative; that’s why I did put it in between ‘ and ’…), being utterly malignant, dirty, foul, angry and grim. And damn yeah, this fits quite perfectly to the monumental and massive sound (the Patologian Laboratorio Studio turns out to be, once again, quite a cool recording place!).
Quite interesting is the varying approach, the differentiation in between several emotions, aural explorations and additional sub-generic additions. All four pieces on this album, Nightmares, Statūe Of Failūre, Black Toad and Amon Unboūnd, sounds quite coherent and cohesive in execution, yet throughout each single piece the attentive listener might find out diverse angles to define this band’s heavy material. It’s about details, specific elements that do define the greatness of this band throughout these highly-artistic creations. It’s not the sound alone that gives that extra dimension of greatness, yet actually the whole performance is quite cool for a relative repetitive effectuation. I guess it’s the performing strength, the variation, the inventive execution and the monumental production that lift up the whole…
Okay, let’s get total loss right now, but what if Esoteric joined forces with Acid Witch, for example, or what if Ancestors got covered by Kongh? Indeed, that’s the point I wanted to make…