The magick to gaze upon a work of art, to become entranced and ensnared by its aura of seducing motion is a rare act, for many works fashioned by another may speak a tongue, but its words hold no weight.Yet there are the few where the tongue which spurts such parables bewitch the mind to don its spit like a skin, to be baptized in its essence and from the copulation of senses…the mind embarks on a journey that is ineffable, yet cathartic and profound.
“The Worship : Orthoprax Satanism” by Curse Upon a Prayer is in many ways the sulfurous spirit to be inhaled, and from its scent, a vulgar candor is released, potent in its aura. For the atrament which courses through these veins shares the similar ichor with other entities such as Spectral Wound and Watain, wherein the clay of Black Metal is carved and shaped with bile retched from the belly of contemptuous wrath and hardened by the winds and melodies originating from a serpentine tongue.
Tracks such as “Sulfurserpent” and “Black Venus Erotica” utilize the alchemical properties of Black Metal transfiguring primordial sounds infused with vehemence to craft a weapon so incendiary in its speech, that its spit gives fire to decimate the tabernacle of congregation. The transmission emitting from Marduk’s “Wormwood” and even the recent offering from Merrimack’s “Of Grace and Gravity” works to build an image on the visceral yet ritualistic nature that surrounds this work, for the very congregation of sound portrayed on this album inverts and perverts all holy images in the excrement of unbridled hate.
The beauty of this work comes forth naught in its cacophony of dissonance but the manner of its architecture, for the way the instrumental variables copulate with the vocals evokes a ceremonial spirit. The album as a whole, seduces the sense, coiling, and like the smoke that curls forth from a burnt offering which blackens the heavens, and from its acrid stench, it imbues a palpable sensation to its art.
The words evoked through Curse Upon a Prayer can be looked upon as the vitriol spit that stains the robes of the one which was flayed upon cross, like that of the platted thorns which pierces the crown of the false prophet, so too does “The Worship : Orthoprax Satanism” cuts through the atmosphere spreading its seed into the womb of light to defile and deconsecrate the pious doctrine.
