Dissonant black metal from the early nineties. There are plenty of examples, which I will not mention chronologically here. After all, I am an editor and not an educator, well, not yours at least. And in the Aarts household, the children (still) aren’t into black metal. The mainstream relentlessly prevails here too. So, Hagatiz is work for the purist who still likes their black metal without frills. The band lineup is clear, but who plays what remains a mystery to me. And honestly, it doesn’t really matter. It fits well with the obscure nature of this band, which has been embraced by the quality label Amor Fati.
Dank and dissonant in the most positive sense of the word: after the intro The Gathering, we mainly hear ghosts from the past, as you might have already sensed. There’s little room for originality, but that’s not the goal. This is what reading the promosheet tells us. Blasting, aggressive black metal filled with old-school vibes is what Hagatiz stands for. Tasting the kidneys of the sacrificed lamb and going wild with passion on the guitars and the minimalistic drum kit. All of this with a touch of mystical and gruesome melodies, as heard during Echoes from the Afterlife. The gates of hell open and we enter to witness pure horror. The vocalist snarls, “I follow the path, into the obscurity” and the sun slowly disappears behind the dark clouds. For a moment, I’m back in my element with pure dark music that genuinely conjures nothing but darkness and sorrow. Fortunately, this record continues with the same recipe, with the dissonant riff work mentioned earlier at the forefront. The abrupt and short-lived hysterical screaming during Everlast in darkest Night completes the picture. Scourge beneath the Skin on the other hand, relies heavily on the delightful drumming, the melodic bridge, and once again, the piercing screams. Magnificent, what a filth! The final track, Necrovoid serves as an outro and adds little value, but this too is something typical of this kind of nineties adoration.
While it may be entirely clear that these three gentlemen are never going to win the originality award, damn it, their ’90s-inspired execution on Cursed to the Night is so accurate and excruciatingly well done. Perhaps this record can please you as well?
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