If the grimly captivating nature of the cover art doesn’t ensnare you, then the subtle dark ambient undertones and myriad hypnotic guitar melodies most certainly will. ‘Zwartmagische Brouwsels’ is an intoxication elixir of Atmospheric Black Metal beauty and rhythm that has been wonderfully created by Dutch duo Udegste.
Opening track ‘Häxanfior’ writhes and spirals through the darkness with mesmerizing clarity, whilst ‘De hekse’ has a softly chanted ritualistic quality that meshes and intertwines itself with the soaring, cosmic sounding synth work. The increasingly haunting nature of this album is contrasted superbly by the harshness of the vocals, and the robustness of the riffs and drum patterns. It would be easy to describe ‘Zwartmagische Brouwsels’ as being folk influenced but to me the bands constant stream of melodies has an almost cosmic, other worldly quality and harkens back to some of the great early 90’s purveyors of Atmospheric Black Metal, as well as some of the bands on the Hungarian scene from the last fifteen years or so.
I especially like the way in which Udegste take the melodic aspect of their sound and let it grow steadily until it reaches a powerful crescendo, before doing the same with the guitar and drums, and its that ebb and flow that really brings life to this powerful, surging and deeply atmospheric album.
