EVOKEN (A Caress Of The Void) CD
This is one of the bands, which music is often mistaken for Doom Metal, but when you compare EVOKEN to bands like Blood Farmers, Saint Vitus, Cold Mourning etc. than there is no need in discussing what is what. It's just crystal clear. What doesn't mean, that EVOKEN don't feel influenced by Doom Metal, but at least it's only important what I can hear on the album and nothing else. Slowness combined with apokalyptic heaviness aren't the most important trademarks of Doom Metal, although still a lot of people think that it's like this. But please, just take a look at the founder Black Sabbath, and tell me how many of their songs have been extremely slow !? Hmm, not very much...Well, anyway, I won't abuse this review as a forum for my accurate description of the term Doom Metal. Maybe next time...
So I concentrate on the new full-length of EVOKEN, which is their fourth one since their very early beginning in 1992. Firstly, this band is much better than all this one-man funeral gothic bands, which are able to create a maximum of boredom. Maybe this fact isn't totally new, because they already showed their potential on previous releases. Meanwhile main man Nick Orlando recruited a new line-up and in 2007 they recorded 'A Caress Of The Void', which has been released a few months later. Secondly, if you like the older EVOKEN stuff, you will love this one. For my taste, the album has its best moments, when the band avoid any gothic influences and here are not only a few songs which have strong tendencies into this direction. In opposite to this, a crusty song like 'Of Purest Absolution' can remind to Winter, especially due to guitarist John Paradiso's brutal voice. While Winter strongly have been influenced by Hellhammer, connected with the attitude and philosphy of UK Hardcore Punk, EVOKEN have a few moments where they can be also compared with Celtic Frost during their 'Into The Pandemonium' period. Of course EVOKEN are more viscous, and 'A Caress Of The Void' flows and rolls out of the speaker like blackest tar.
Every single riff is slow as fuck and heavy as hell, while the guitar seems to be downtuned to the center of the earth and I can't deny the band's capabilities in creating a dark and gloomy atmosphere. They have talent in arranging their monolithic song-structures in an interesting way, but I've never been a fan of all this gothic kitsch, and as mentioned before, EVOKEN have interwoven too much of this into their sound. In the past, it was the main reason why I never really get into their music, no matter which release I had chosen. I respect the fact, that EVOKEN has been arround since the early 90's, but once again 'A Caress Of The Void' won't change my opinion about this US-band. Despite my own taste, I guess that this album will be a wet dream for fans of bands like Thergothon, Esoteric or Skepticism just to name a few. It's once again a further proof, that I Hate Records only sign the most qualitative bands in the spectrum of extreme metal.
(KK)