Kvaen – The Formless Fire
Release Date: 21st June 2024
Label: Metal Blade Records
Bandcamp
Genre: Black Metal, Melodic Black Metal, Melodic Death Metal, Heavy Metal.
FFO: In Aphelion, Blackbraid, Moonlight Sorcery, Night Crowned.
Review By: Rick Farley
The combination of melodic black metal with traditional heavy metal elements is something that I find absolutely fascinating and extremely hard to not love. The sheer ugliness of black metal intertwined with triumphant neoclassical leads and dark melodic flourishes makes me grin from ear to ear. One minute powerfully melodic and virtuosos and the next thrashy, blackened speed metal all with shrieky, growly vocals. Blackened to the core, but with a gloriousness in the riffs and melodies that are occasionally akin to the NWOBHM. When done right, it is simply addicting. Spoiler alert, this is pretty fucking great.
Jacob Björnfot, the sole, creative mastermind behind Kvaen calls Kalix, Sweden home. This remote and beautiful spot full of vast pine forest and icy lakes is near the Finnish border, on the northernmost shores of the Baltic, and because of its epic surroundings (bizarre weather conditions, northern lights, etc.) It has had an immense impact on the atmospheric sound of Kvaen. The sounds of chilly gloominess, infectious melodies and vile brutishness coming together to form an amalgamation of magnificent victory and malevolent violence. Album number three being released on Metal blade Records, The Formless Fire is an explorative extension of both 2020s The Funereal Pyre and 2022’s The great Below in every way. Feeling slightly more accessible than the previous two records, The Formless Fire is more melodic, thrashier, and wickedly musical without sacrificing any of the black metal hostility.
The explosive speed of razor sharp tremolo guitars and blast beats of Basilisk, slithers with venomous ferocity, just like the mythological creature it is titled after. The serpent king’s mere gaze is lethal. The track whips and thrashes with unrelenting intensity and shadowlike, mystic playfulness. Jacob Björnfot who sings and plays all the instruments minus the drums concocts a vile piece of evil black metal complete with a neoclassical inspired shred-fest. The battering of drums on The Formless Fire is carried out by ex-Amon Amarth skin destroyer Frederik Andersson.
De Dödas Sång (Song of the Dead) bears the weight of disturbing lyrical themes rooted in Norse history. That of Ättestupa, the ancient Norse suicide ritual where elderly villagers jump to their deaths from sheer precipices. The main guitar riff is mercilessly rooted in a heavy metal thrashiness. Its intoxicating rhythmic charge pushes the guitars forward in such a way that it’s near impossible to not headbang uncontrollably. The weighty drums follow suit with foot stomping beats, only to delve deep in a hammering of blasting from the frosty black metal terrain the track sways back and forth from.
The Perpetual Darkness takes a searing atmospheric approach with loosely airy guitars and heroic melodies. Lyrically about being a lone wolf and banished from society, with the theme of being born different from the norm. This is a mid-paced track, never going overboard on ferocity, and has more of a moody melodic feel. Like every track on The Formless Fire, the solos are absolutely burners. Cleary Jacob is quite skilled in everything he is doing here, but these leads are top-notch, next level.
Kvaen has shown once again that black metal does not have to be inaccessible or unlistenable to the masses to be amazing. I absolutely love the “trve kvlt” sounds of yesteryear, and have been a fan for many, many years, but The Formless Fire is modern black metal done expertly. It is just as haunting, spiteful, nasty, and dark, it just happens to have better musicianship and less raw production. This could very well be the best black metal album released this year. Check this one out immediately.
(5 / 5)
