PERDITION WINDS: "Perdition Winds"

You may recognize the musicians of Perdition Winds from various death and thrash oriented underground acts such as Lie in Ruins, Neutron Hammer and Desolate Shrine, but in this particular case they've grouped to manifest occult reeking sinister black metal without much links to the above-mentioned genres of 'catchier' nature. This is crawling in moderate tempo, never rushing to any lively riffs nor solos, but just focusing on the efficiently evoked atmosphere of darkness.

After the rather general intro (that the EP could live without, I think, as it eats quite much of the overall length already), ”Purification” starts its ominous riffing which is soon backed up by blast beats and very low-end growls, around the pitch of Hate Forest. The moderately professional production and discordant riffing nods to the direction of many recent religious black metal groups à la Ondskapt, and thus there's not much uniqueness in the riffs. That's not a definite hindrance however, as it still sounds authentic, and I love the way how e.g. this song and ”Corrupted Image of God” flow seamlessly together thanks to a lurking acoustic guitar pattern in between. So where Perdition Winds suffers in its, well, unoriginality, there's plenty of thoughtful ideas here that lure for replay, to discover more what this mysterious creation possesses within. The self-titled ”Perdition Winds” and ”Path Revealed” conclude the journey without much changes in the style of malignant and rather modern black metal, though it is worth mentioning that the latter belongs to the EP's best moments, incorporating some latently melancholic flavours.

The production is what rises to the EP's only proper fault as it lacks the punch of all instrument: they're all somewhat muffled in a distance, creating a rather suffocating tone that, on the other hand, has its own charm, as an intangible evil spirit, but I still believe this would have sounded better with a more punishing sound. All in all, Perdition Winds isn't the most peculiar EP out there right now, but with a line-up of this high quality I'm sure they're able to pull out a great full-length – here's to hoping that such will come, that is.

3.5 / 5