By: The Austrian Black Metal Webzine

Rate: 6,5 of 10

What other bands promise in tempo and hardness will be exceeded by this Finnish band almost over the whole runtime on VUOHIVASARA's by now fourth release (incl. the split with Wårpath). After a couple of peaceful beats as slightly misleading introduction a stormy hurricane takes you away and does not calm down that quickly. Unfortunately the sound of the opener is slightly flanelly so that the instruments are not completely receiving the attention they would deserve. Therefore the opener song looses a lot of its penetrating power, which exactly is the significant factor in the drum parts that are just too silent to be heard.

Despite of everything, VUOHIVASARA makes clear right in the beginning that they pay only a little attention to a too degenerating melodic orientation, squiggling interludes or if even at all to kitschy keyboardsequences. Due to the rather short runtime of on average three minutes the songs come immediately to the point, bludgeon the pent-up aggressions of the band members to the ears, but still are not - seen from the length point of view - exhausting or boring. The attempt to bring some alternation to the singing introduction with a short (hardly noticeable due to way too silent mix), clear, almost oper-like singing in "Drawings in the Darkness" goes definitely wrong, since this commercial appearing excursion does by no means at all fit to the otherwise so raw and brutal appearance of the band. Much more authenticity is hidden in the grindparts of "Heresy Torment", which furthermore even force the brute side of the music. Until the end a lot will not change at it, since except of the rather peaceful "Glare of Twilight" that insted has nearly superior guitar courses in repertoire, the tempo will be focused on like crazy without lapsing into blind furiousness though. Under the line there will be left a respectable performance that in fact lacks all kind of innovation but is in return hammered out with perceptible joy in music.

To become completely pleased with "The Sigil" you absolutely should be a fanatic fan of fast and brutal black metal that furthermore is presented without curlicues or any other insertions of fabric softeners. Even if all of the songs can be differentiated from each other the music is still - due to the high tempo of the album's material – a little bit too homogeneous to cause bustle outside the target audience.

Many thanks to Maiju Schrey for translation!