This is a Danish/Italian group whom have members of the most excellent Krossburst (Ita) and Denial of God (Dnk) with those members also existing within Black Oath. The black/doom approach will bring striking similarities to the Celtic Frost mantle, with its dark heavy doom laden death approach whilst some of the more momentous work harks to latter beastly Darkthrone work to my ears. Following on from their well received EP ‘The Brocken Fires’, this is their debut full length release.

Opening with a dank dense instrumental, the atmospherics build into the first and lead track ‘The Black Effigy’. This edges on the catacombs of doom, when its speeds up you get some real momentum followed then by some mid pace, it is simply mind gripping the way the tempos play out and captivate the listener. The vocals handled by Denial of Gods “Ustumallagam” rabid, but have clarity to decipher the message. ‘Children of Belial’ has more of a black metal flavour, on beat drumming, and a gnarly distorted doomy guitar sound still present great atmospherics. Something akin to Thor’s hammer blow welcomes the slower monolithic passages, the power is captured with precision on this recording. ‘Necromancy’ is certainly one of the highlights of the release. You can quite easily hear the influences as mentioned earlier and a slight gnarly approach to pre-Viking era Bathory crossing swords with Candlemass. There is certainly the dark passion presented in a very professional context with a rather eerie quiet section in the centre of the track, a sepulchral/melancholy narrative as described in the PR material.  What I like is the effortless transition between speedier blackened music to the heavy and slower doom inspired parts further exemplified in ‘The Bornless One’ and ‘Echoes of Past Lives’.  As expected by the title, ‘Trespassing the Chapel’ adds more morbid character, it includes a touch of death metal synergy in the tempo, and yet, still picks out their black doom elements much more than many who tend to go too far, this is subtle, but it really works well.

As you travel through this debut, there is a growing love, you have the material at your mercy, you have energy, power, precision with really top quality delivery with seamless arrangements through their morbid black metal. A hybrid of sub-genres, this isn’t something I generally take on board in terms of writing about it, but I have to say, I’m more than happy to shout about this release. It has all the legendary hallmarks that many have grown with, the putrefaction is captured but also a touch of quality is added. It’s not too raw, it has a good vibe and it has a great dark aura.

(8/10 Paul Maddison)

https://www.facebook.com/The-Rite-band-page-219647875291113

https://ironboneheadproductions.bandcamp.com/album/the-rite-liturgy-of-the-black