Thursday 28th March 2024,
The Black Planet

WITHERSCAPE – The Northern Sanctuary

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 Three years have passed since the release of Witherscape’s debut album ”The Inheritance”, a successful release that put the band in a high pedestal. Now it’s 2016 and the band, whose members are Ragnar Widerberg (guitars, bass) and the already legend Dan Swanö (Vocals, Keyboards, Drums), released a new album called ”The Northern Sanctuary”.

The album starts with a brutal song called ”Wake Of Infinity” showing exactly how the majority of the album is. All the instruments come together fitting perfectly accompanying the voice of Dan. The next tracks are ”In The Eyes Of Idols” and ”Rapture Ballet”, two equally smashing songs like the first one. At this point we hear a kind of a ”battle” between the clean vocals and the growls.

This battle goes on throughout the entire album. Fourth track is ”The Examiner”. This one starts calmly with an acoustic guitar and a piano joined by the beautiful clean voice of Dan Swanö, but after a while it goes back to being heavy, although not so heavy as the previous songs. ”Marionette” is a ballad and the fifth song of ”The Northern Sanctuary”. Now its only a guitar and the clean voice that starts the song until it comes an exploding chorus (with growls) shaking completely the song and then it goes back to being calm. Following this comes ”Divinity”, a catchy song with a cool chorus that mixes the harsh vocals and a clean choir, and ”God Of Ruin” maintaining the same vibe of the first tracks. ”The Northern Sanctuary”,the title track of the album, is an epic thirteen minute long hymn to the progressive metal music. The album finishes with ”Vila I Frid” (swedish for rest in peace), a small piano piece that gives it a beautiful end.

”The Northern Sanctuary” is a masterpiece that represents the good progressive metal. Good vocals, simple and beautiful solos, good technique and a good production. Any metal fan can enjoy this release.

9/10

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