Cult of Eibon – “Lycan Twilight Sorcery” [Album Review]

If you hear thrash-style guitar shredding and dungeon synth playing in the hazy glow of a full moon at midnight, you might have unknowingly played a copy of Cult of Eibon’s latest release, Lycan Twilight Sorcery (Iron Bonehead Productions). Don’t attempt a quiet sojourn in a clearing in the heart of the woods at night while playing this record. Be warned. Men will turn into horrid wolfmen, werewolves if you will, and the heart of a man will beat three times as fast without fail, as only silver bullets can put these hybrid beasts to rest.

Cult of Eibon does its own take on first wave black metal on Lycan Twilight Sorcery. There’s elements of old thrash metal, old school heavy metal, NWOBHM, all while vocalist Porphyrion howls and screeches in the iconic black metal style.

Cult of Eibon’s Nyogtha and Porphyrion are veterans in the underground metal scene, with the former still currently involved with Black Blood Invocation and Hate Manifesto, while the latter is a current member of vaunted underground act Kawir. Drummer Xa’Ligha rounds out the band.

The thrashy riffs on Lycan Twilight Sorcery slit throats with razor-sharp precision. Blastbeats tear through the fabric of time and space as the beats hit a crescendo. Cult of Eibon rekindle a love for first-wave black metal lost long ago. There’s a Dark Angel meets Mercyful Fate mix going on here, but Cult of Eibon is very much in its own niche. They sound quite resplendent on this album, and a push of the play button brings back memories of cold, misty winter nights in forests full of gnarly trees. Townsmen and villagers in the Northern-most regions must fear what this music hints at bringing back through time. Across plains of fertile seedbeds and valleys rich with harvested grains, the deep dark woods beckon not far away, and there live the shadows of predators and waiting unseen horrors.

This is not tremolo picked second wave vernacular. The fast downpicks and uppicks are paced with plenty of alternate pick shredding and sixth string violence. The snare and bass drums on record are adequately engineered, so the snare drumming absolutely pummels during blast sections. There’s even a brief bass solo on track six, Lykauges. And yes, the keyboard sections accompanying the double bass kicking and shredding is penultimate for old school metal accompanied by dungeon synth. The basslines aren’t fat, thick, gobby renditions of bass-heavy groove metal. The bass just adds enough meat to the rhythm section, and combined with the acoustic percussion, provides a fitting soundtrack to lycanthropes roaming desolate woodlands for men who have lost the will to live.

Iron Bonehead Productions has been issuing several good albums and EPs lately, and Cult of Eibon’s Lycan Twilight Sorcery has to be one of the reliable label’s better releases. Don’t drag your weary limbs to the heart of the Northern wooded mists without this album as a fitting soundtrack. Usher the return of man’s primal state. Conjure the wolf in thyself.

Lycan Twilight Sorcery Track Listing:

01. The Final Transformation
02. The Dweller of the Woods
03. Lycan Twilight Sorcery
04. Wolf Blood Communion
05. Xothic Bloodlines
06. Lykauges (outro)
07. Dominions of the Serpent Moon

Run Time: 34:15
Release Date: April 28, 2017

Check out the song “The Dweller Of The Woods”