Furze

Reaper Subconscious Guide

Agonia Records 2010

From the opening note Reaper Subconscious Guide you know things are different for Furze.  A highly organic sound resonates throughout the doom laden riffs Earlier Than The Third Might of the Cosmos.  Strange and disorienting vocals stalk the soundscape of old school doom riffs.  The music sways between a Sabbathy vibe and a bleak and cold Nordic black metal style.  A more insistent doom riff bounds along on It Leads.  The dual layered vocals which jump out of alternating speakers proves to be quite unsettling.  A crystalline chiming adds an air of ceremonial magic to the track while the deep vocals stand proud and imposing.  Odd and even bizarre xylophone instrumentation circles within warbling guitar riffs and sharply plucked notes as the tripped-out meanderings of Immortal Lecture get underway.  Rasped vocals and uptempo black metal riffs cut like a cold wind as the song progresses towards throbbing Sabbath guitarwork.  A spacey mood settles into the darkness that is The Bonedrum.  A deep pounding represents said drum and it beats incessantly like an omen of impending destruction.  The psychedelic guitarwork and dreamy bass lines add the sensation of a drug-induced journey across through the desert of your mind.  The haunting xylophone reaches a climactic arc as its frailty transcends the shifting darkness that surrounds it.  Undulating textures of sound caress your ears as the final track, Essential Wait unloads its vast array of moods.  Straight doom riffing, bluesy accents, psychedelic musings, and plodding black metal all rear their myriad heads within this loosely woven tapestry.  It's as if the artist has been locked in a blackened room to unleash all his inner demons and strangled emotions.  And in this context Woe J. Reaper has crafted an album that is sincere and immediate.  Bridging the folds between the worlds of psychedelic doom and freezing Nordic black metal, Reaper Subconscious Guide exhales a breath of freshness within the stale black metal underground to a chilling and disconcerting effect.  Furze haunts the fringes and exudes obscurity.  I get truly lost in contemplation and exploration as I listen to Reaper Subconscious Guide.