Review by Dominik on November 8, 2024.

For decades, my best metal buddy and I have been on a mission: to sift through the (extreme) metal scene and uncover hidden gems. Back in the ’80s, this involved endless handwritten lists, cassette trades, and enough photocopied zines to deforest a small nation. If we fast forward to today, also our wrinkled metal minds are at the mercy of the endless digital cosmos. However, some treasures manage to evade our search algorithms. Though it feels like everything is out there, somewhere, occasionally we still stumble upon a masterpiece hidden in the shadows. That’s where I come in, your trusty (?) guide through the murk, here to pull gems like Lunar Chalice’s “Transcendentia: The Shadow Pilgrimage” out from under their veil of obscurity. But beware, this is an album that drags you into the dark only to leave you there, longing for light and wondering why you ever thought escape was an option.

Now, Lunar Chalice hasn’t exactly been hiding under a rock—more like under a very large, moss-covered slab of German black metal tradition. Active since 2019, with a demo, two EPs, and now this debut, they’ve made their pilgrimage through the shadows of the scene. And shadows, dear reader, are where they thrive. “Transcendentia: The Shadow Pilgrimage” is no mere album—it’s a masterclass in how to make eight songs feel like an endless descent into the void, even when three of those tracks are just there to help you catch your breath (or so you think).

The first thing you’ll notice when plunging into this sonic abyss is the atmosphere. It’s a thick, oppressive wall of sound. It is dense and suffocating, like having your face pressed against a wet graveyard wall while still letting you breathe—if just barely. The vocals alternate between deep-throat, guttural, blackened growling, and a more haunting, almost liturgical chant. This gives the album that much-needed variety that keeps it from getting lost in the black sea of forgettable blasts and riffs we’ve all heard before. It’s a rare trick and one that works brilliantly here. It’s a conjuring and threatening performance that grips you and refuses to let go.

Now, let´s move on to the album itself. Unfortunately, out of eight tracks, three are intro, interlude, and outro, which leaves us with just five full-fledged songs. But those five songs? Absolute blackened journeys. After the short intro, “Calix Cum Velum” kicks things off with a blistering pace, setting the tone for the entire album. The guitar work is relentless, the vocals cut through the chaos, and you’re immediately thrust into a realm of no mercy and no hope. The opener conveys a sense of foreboding that permeates everything to follow and makes it clear that this album is not here to save you from the abyss but rather to push you into the black void.

“Immortuae” continues right where the opener leaves off, and before you know it, you’re hooked. The riffs get under your skin and don’t let go. But don’t worry—there’s more punishment where that came from. “Descending Shadows” teases you with a quiet start, lulling you into a false sense of security before dragging you, once again, into the blackened depths. The bass here is particularly notable, not just keeping time but actively driving the descent into madness. This isn’t your typical “follow the guitars” type of bass; it’s a rogue force, working in tandem with the riffs to make sure your descent is as unpleasant as possible.

Another one of the standout moments is “Flagellationis Diaboli,” where the softer, almost spoken sung parts feel like a personal accusation. It’s as if the band’s telling you, directly, that you’re a weak, unworthy worm. And by the time the song ends, you’ll believe it. You’ll want to follow them on their hopeless pilgrimage to endless pain and the pleasures of hell, even though every fiber of your being is screaming at you to turn back.

Lunar Chalice doesn’t need an all-out blastfest to get their message across. The band can rely on its ability to weave slower parts into the intense performance that neither feels out of place nor diminish the sense that there is absolutely no escape from being deeply dragged into “Transcendentia: The Shadow Pilgrimage”. They don’t need to pummel you nonstop; they want you to feel the weight of every note, every moment of despair. It is something inevitable, as though the album is a black hole and you’re just a piece of space debris being pulled toward it. By the time the last notes of “Nocturnalia” fade out, you’ll be hitting play again, resigned to the fact that you’ve just become a disciple of Lunar Chalice’s dark universe, and there’s no leaving.

Now, if we’re picking at bones, “The Astral Stargate” feels slightly weaker than the rest of the material—it’s not bad by any stretch, just not as compelling as the other songs. And yes, the presence of three acoustic intro/interlude/outro means you’re only getting five true tracks, which leaves a slight itch for more. But hey, even Satan has his off days or maybe I’m just greedy.

Rating: 9/10 - because this album doesn’t just drag you into the darkness—it leaves you there, utterly mesmerized, hoping for a sequel to your descent.

Review by Rosh on October 3, 2023.

Red Fang is definitely one of those bands that I see as "another one of a lot" rather than the most independent entity, since along with bands like The Sword and High on Fire, they're basically another draw in the hat of modern stoner rock/metal. They somehow have a modern sound for sure, but actually, it's hard to say exactly what distinguishes this movement of early-mid 2000's bands from those of the 90's. If I had to take a stab at it, though, I guess it has something to do with the increased diversity among this movement when you factor in the similarity of other modern acts like Mastodon or whatever to the aforementioned stoner bands. This crop of artists seem to augment their sound with elements that would've initially broken the boundaries of stoner rock/metal, and so it's not surprising that a lot of bands belonging to this circle are also mentioned as the face of modern heavy music.

And Red Fang is, I suppose, a textbook example of this movement because their influences are pretty diverse, packaging everything stoner and doom adjacent into a coherent offering. In a decade or so, they seem to have only further embraced both their more melodic and their more aggressive tendencies, which is nice to see because it contradicts stoner music's long-running reputation for being one-note and repetitive. Only Ghosts is, then, not only well-balanced, but consistently enjoyable across its 10 tracks. Imagine the more outlandish and groovy riff tendencies of Soundgarden meshed with the gritty crunch of High on Fire for a good picture of what Red Fang do on their 2016 offering. Along those lines, this is definitely some of the "grungier" stoner rock I have heard, with many tracks transitioning into bouncy power chord riffs after their initial guitar or bass hook, ones that sound immensely influenced by Black Sabbath without being particularly metal either. Specifically, one should listen for the "oh-oh, oh-oh, ah-ohh" vocals in "Cut It Short" for a good example of this band's less metal tendencies, in spite of how heavy they are.

One enigmatic thing about the music on Only Ghosts is that almost all of the instrumentation is a bit more staccato-heavy than the majority of groovy metal you'll hear, which works acceptably well with the lyrical refrains that involve repeating the same general phrase with slightly different wording every time ("Shadows" and "Not For You" in particular). This is a decent formula, because the music relies on this stop-and-start thump to milk catchiness out of repetition, but it still means you feel like you've heard every song on the album before, even if they all do sound quite nice. I have mixed feelings about this, because while Kyuss and Orange Goblin never struggled with making the listener feel like they've heard the tunes on the album before, those bands also never sounded this unique, or used repetition to a hypnotic effect.

Production-wise, Only Ghosts is Red Fang's strongest offering yet, with everything sounding full and up-front. This means that all the niche tendencies of the compositions still present themselves strongly, even if they do bleed together. This is quite important, too, because the band has quite a layered sound, from the ever-prominent low-end, to the psychedelic echo effect on the vocals, to the more low-keyed lead guitar work. Furthermore, when they get more sludgy on tracks like "The Smell of the Sound", they're basically slowing down the tempo enough to where you can appreciate the richness of their soundscape. Overall, the music on Only Ghosts isn't more involved than it needs to be, but it's got these subtle intricacies buried beneath its overt accessibility and energy.

Red Fang is pretty much the archetype for modern stoner rock, or whatever you want to call this type of rock/metal. With their 2016 effort, they offer something that isn't quite safe considering it's still relatively eclectic sounding stuff, but is definitely going to resonate with a newer generation of heavy rock fans. I'm not sure exactly what the mood or the attitude of this kind of music is, so I don't have a thematic note to close on, but it might be something along the lines of "she still wants to know what I still don't know..."

Rating: 8.4 out of 10