The Ominous Circle made a strong impression with their 2017 debut Appalling Ascension, which offered dense and murky death metal alongside some slower methodical doom. Considering the group was made up of members from a slew of different bands in the Portuguese metal scene, it wasn’t surprising that things seemed fully formed from the start and while there were some pacing issues Appalling Ascension has still been an album I’ve returned to in the years since. Periodically I’d check in to see if there were any rumblings of a follow-up, and after eight years the group has finally emerged from the shadows with Cloven Tongues of Fire. This time around the slower methodical doom elements are used to build up to absolutely massive and destructive peaks where the lines between death and black metal blur, and the results are even more intense than before.
Where its predecessor opted for a lengthy intro, Cloven Tongues of Fire has a short one-minute intro that lets some reverberations create a sense of tension. “Lowest Immanations” gives listeners a good idea of the approach the band is going for this time around, as it opens with a methodical build-up and scorching solo before moving to mid-tempo death metal. The sound is very bottom heavy and leans more into blackened death metal at certain points, but which makes every passage really wail on the listener no matter how fast or slow the band is going. Each of the main tracks on the album are fairly lengthy, coming in between six and nine minutes, but The Ominous Circle does a great job of maintaining tension even during the slower sections. Songs have a natural ebb and flow, allowing haunting and bleak atmosphere to build and be broken up by denser death metal blasting. So far this probably sounds on par with what the group offered on their debut, but what pushes many of these tracks over the edge are the solos. Where some death metal has solos as flashy window dressing, The Ominous Circle uses them as a way to push the sound to its most intense and scorching levels. “Through Tunnels Ablaze” demonstrates this with a soaring, powerful melodic solo that then twists into a much denser and fiery tone, while the other tracks let them expand outwards like flames consuming everything in their path. The attention to detail in how the solos tear down and rebuild the already dense instrumental layers make a big difference and have kept me coming back to this material often.
The vocals move between extreme highs and low pitches, with the lows coming through as an almost brutal death type of guttural growl while the higher end is oriented towards shrieks and other raspy approaches. Like the first album, this style makes The Ominous Circle a bit different in sound compared to some of the other black/death metal bands of this type, and on some of the slower moments where the instrumentation is a bit sparser each word thumps you in the chest. You also get some very distorted and inhuman sounding pitches on “Writhing, Upturning, Succumbing”, which feels appropriate given the track title. Also worth calling out is the mix, which lets the vocals hit hard without having them overpower the rest of the band.
This sophomore effort from The Ominous Circle has been a long time coming, but they’ve really stepped things up on every front. There’s a better flow to the material, with the slower doom sections now keeping a constant sense of tension, and the intensity of the black/death elements fit well within the bleaker atmosphere. When you add the wild solos that reshape and intensify the already dense instrumentation, the results are incredible and make this a late year highlight. Cloven Tongues of Fire is available from Osmose Productions.
-Review by Chris Dahlberg