Kroh - Necromancer
KROH CRUSHES ON ‘NECROMANCER’ EP
For a while, doom metal seemed on the brink of doom, as in becoming trite and derivative as all get-out. There were exceptions, of course, such as Conan, SubRosa, and perhaps, depending on your personal taste, Candlemass.
Kroh | Photo: Rich Thompson
The UK’s Kroh just dropped a three-track EP, entitled Necromancer, that’s not only non-derivative, but original in all the best ways: beau coup distortion, cavernous depth, smoldering textures, and beguiling vocals.
Kroh, on this EP, is made up of Oliwia Sobieszek (vocals) and Paul Kenney (guitar), with additional guitars by Paul Harrington, and Paul Catten on therimin.
Originally formed in 2011 by Paul Kenney, with Francis Anthony contributing vocals, Kroh dropped two splits with Fukpig and Ice Dragon. Because the sound wasn’t right, Kenney set the project aside for a while. Two years later, he resurrected Kroh, arriving with a new line-up, featuring Sobieszek on vocals. Her mesmerizing tones, along with the from-the-bowels-of-hell music coalesced into something special.
The rhythm is measured, but powerful as Dante’s deepest circle of hell, Treachery, where Satan himself resides.
“Slaughter” opens the EP, riding oscillating tones and subterranean-flavored guitars tuned to something like drop-F, deep and dark with glorious resonance. The rhythm is measured, but powerful as Dante’s deepest circle of hell, Treachery, where Satan himself resides. Sobieszek’s haunting tones glide like liquescent globes full of light over the music, infusing the tune with hypnotic hues found only in the Empyrean.
“Purge” features vibrating distortion designed to rattle your inner organs, and then takes on mystical luminous pigments, prior to elevating to stentorian levels once again. The declarative causality of the harmonics resembles the clash of the Titans. Like binding spells of sonic sorcery, Sobieszek’s voice wafts as if traveling on ozone smelling mists. This is a grand, wonderful, evocative voice, spectral and serene, yet ominous and portentous.
The title track is the highlight of the EP, surging with dark, wicked muscular guitars crowned by Sobieszek’s wistful crystalline timbres, as if something dreadfully, nastily tight is about to happen. This track is so buff it hurts – in a superb way.
Necromancer delivers hypertrophic, storm-tossed dynamics, compelling rhythms, and the exquisitely seductive voice of Oliwia Sobieszek.
