Entry 468 - Winterfylleth - The Mercian Sphere

 

This is one of those bands I got into right when they started. Right around the end of the decade (2008-2009) I got into Winterfylleth, Altar of Plagues, Woodensthrone, and Fen. They all had that hypnotic blackgaze feel to them. Out of all the bands though Winterfylleth has the strongest black metal sound.

While The Ghost of Heritage was a decent debut album, I felt like it was lacking. I really liked a lot of the acoustic elements and choirs but felt they were  limited to just a few moments in the album. I was hoping that the band would fully embrace them on future releases. Enter The Mercian Sphere.

The Mercian Sphere takes blast beat driven black metal, combines it with hypnotic riffing and ups the folk elements hinted at on the debut album to one of the major parts of the bands sound. The instant the record starts you know something is different, a male choir leads the album for a few moments before the blast beats come in. The first time I heard it I got chills and goosebumps.

This album was everything I wanted out of Winterfylleth's sound. It has ear-worm melodies, it has powerful vocals - both clean and harsh - it has folk instrumentals that feature guitar and violin. Hell, it has entire acoustic breakdowns in the longer songs that put the album to the next level. This is all the potential the Winterfylleth displayed on the debut realized outright.

The Mercian Sphere is easily one of the better black metal albums of the early 2010's. This is fully embracing both the black metal as well as the folk elements without either becoming overbearing. Other bands trying to create something in this field should take note.