WARDENCLYFFE – Control All Delete
- Posted on 17-04-2015
Witty title for an album, I must say – a play on the infamous computer keyboard task that hopefully will unfreeze or clear a program you may be stuck in. Sweden’s Wardenclyffe started in 2011, releasing their demo "Ordo ab Chao" a year later and signing a record deal to finally release a full-length record. The 6 songs in main (after the 1:47 "The World Sensorium Pt. 1" intro) march to an older doom/ death ethos – one that started in the early 90’s and hasn’t been around much in the past decade.
Imagine a mix of early Paradise Lost, Celtic Frost, and Samael – musically more in the doom arena but the vocals can intertwine melancholic despair and growling death. Lead work can be sparse and tasteful, forming another melodic tie-in to the main riffs at hand – check out "Orcadian Dream" especially in this regard. Eerie keyboard feedback and spoken word narrative elements punctuate the even slower crawl of "Everlearning- Neverknowing", the double kick providing a semi-tribal march to the brooding chord choices and slightly Native American textures during the 5:07-5:31 instrumental section of this magnificent, almost 7 minute odyssey.
Doom overall as a genre can be played slow, slower, or at an arrestingly low heart beats per minute ratio. Wardenclyffe use all three speeds to get their point across, the latter on my favorite track "Macroshift" that contains some cultural guitar themes that probably bring Opeth to mind – if taken through that early 90’s doom/death template. 40 minutes later, "Control All Delete" usually gains an immediate second go through – as this is the stuff of legends and rarely heard in a current scene that seems to favor the stoner or sludge oriented acts versus those in the straighter doom/death category.
Quite a debut record. Strike the hammer, crack open the crevices of your mind and let the flood of dark imagery and heaviness consume you.