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BEHÖLDER “In the Temple of the Tyrant”
BEHÖLDER “In the Temple of the Tyrant”
By Dr. Abner Mality
If the epic doom of CANDLEMASS and SOLITUDE AETURNUS floats your gloomy boat, the Gothic sounds of BEHÖLDER should tide you over quite nicely. Honestly, their resemblance to SOLITUDE AETURNUS is so great that it is only a slight difference in the vocals that allows me to tell the two apart.
There are worse bands to emulate than the long dormant Texas doomsters. When the opening power chords of “A Pale Blood Sky” come crashing in, I almost expected Messiah Marcolin or Robert Lowe to take over on vocals. That’s how epic doom this is. Much of BEHÖLDER has risen from the carcass of power metal band JUDICATOR, including singer John Yelland. Much like Lowe did with both SOLITUDE and CANDLEMASS, Yelland’s clear tones are perfect for tragic tales of dungeons and blood-soaked battlefields. Speaking of which, it’s pretty obvious we’ve got some top grade D & D nerds here, as the band is named after the one-eyed demon of the classic board game.
The SOLITUDE/CANDLEMASS worship continues across the breadth of the record, but I find the stronger tunes come in the first half. “Dungeon Crawl” does indeed crawl just as the name implies, driven by a cool bass riff. “Eyes of the Deep” features the great monster growls of Tomi Joutsen of AMORPHIS, which beautifully contrast with Yelland’s clean work. “For Those Who Fell” is a rather typical dark ballad, but one that is very heartfelt.
Then I think things kind of drop off some. “Draconian” (Slave Or Master) and “Summoned...Bound” are not terrible songs but come across as very rote doom metal. “I, Magus” closes the album well with a truly epic finale, but it occurs to me that BEHÖLDER is not quite on the same level as CRYPT SERMON, who have taken CANDLEMASS and METAL CHURCH influences and worked them into something wholly their own. With BEHÖLDER, I never get the impression I’m listening to anything more than a very good SOLITUDE AETURNUS knockoff.
That being said, this is epic doom in the classic tradition and since SOLITUDE don’t have anything new coming up, BEHÖLDER can help fill that gap.
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