Warthur Now, here's something refreshingly different - progressive doom metal! Blood Ceremony play a style of proto-metal which never was: it mostly sounds like a fusion of the heavy, dirty riffs of early Black Sabbath with the dynamic flute-guitar interplay of Jethro Tull, with a witchy atmosphere reminiscent of Black Widow capping things off. It's a fascinating mixture which makes Blood Ceremony the best sort of retro band: they've hit on a style of music which absolutely could have emerged back in 1970 if the relevant musical trends at the time (proto-metal and pagan/prog folk) had only connected, but for some reason never quite emerged. Rather than indulging nostalgia for old bands, they fill in a hole in musical history which I never noticed but was clearly overdue a little exploration. Mindblowing.

Phonebook Eater 6/10

"Living With The Ancients" is a decent vintage Doom Metal album, but not as good as the hype suggests.

It’s nice to hear some good vintage doom metal every once in a while. Blood Ceremony, from Canada, have released back in 2008 a very obscure album that nobody seemed to notice. This year, they’re receiving much more attention, thanks to “Living With The Ancients”. The story here is very similar to many bands out there right now in 2011 that are getting acclaimed, to name one Appearance Of Nothing, whose album I just reviewed.

Blood Ceremony is, in a way, the most original band out there right now. In another way, this band is just as banal and unoriginal as a pair of dirty sox. That’s because we’ve heard this type of music so many times that our ears will bleed if we hear to another hard rock/proto metal band. But not in 2011, a very experimental and avant-garde year in music in my opinion. Basically, the sound of the band has huge influences of those proto metal/ hard rock bands from the seventies, especially the most heavy ones (an obvious hats off to Black Sabbath), but also some folkish influences, thanks to the massive use of the flute (this time, a hats off to Jethro Tull and Ian Anderson) along the album. There is also, along with the vintage guitars and all the other mentioned stuff, an organ very used to give a more powerful and full sound to the music. The most distinctive element though is most definitely the female vocals by Alia O’Brien ( hoping I’m writing that correctly). So I find it pretty hard to define this type of music metal, having such strong roots to the past.

Even from the lyrical point of view the band is heavily influenced by Black Sabbath; songs about dark magic, Satanic rituals, witches and such. There is though more interest in the pagan world than in Iommi’s band, like the title of the title can suggest. I have to admit that I wasn’t crazy for many songs; too unoriginal, not that I don’t like vintage retro music, but I find it a little boring if it is done with insistency, like this type of music is. Excellent highlights can be found in the gripping and hypnotizing “The Great God Pan”, “My Demon Brother”, and the final ten minute “Daughter Of The Sun”. There are a few filler songs, but I don’t mind them like many do. There is one short instrumental, “The Hermit”, which didn’t grab my attention particularly. In fact, some of the songs here, like “Night Of The Augury” or “Morning Of The Magicians”, I just don’t find that appealing, but that just taste.

In fact, I don’t really have anything bad to say about this album; it’s just that I didn’t like it for pure and simple personal reasons. It can happen to feel like that for an album.

adg211288 Living With the Ancients is the second album from Blood Ceremony, a band that brings forth a real retro sound in their music that manages to sound like a cross between the heavy guitar tones of early Black Sabbath and the flute of Jethro Tull with a good dose of psychedelic rock thrown in for good measure, all is topped off with a great female vocal.

Although they are often considered as doom metal, Blood Ceremony comes across to have more in common with classic rock bands, although they’re a bit heavier. Opening track The Great God Pan features great rocking guitar riffs from Sean Kennedy, nicely broken up with a lead line. Vocalist Alia O'Brien sets a high standard for exceptional performing here which is maintained throughout the record. After a seemingly standard start to the track the band suddenly throws everything up in the air with the first appearance of some psychedelic organ sounds, which also gives the album its first sort of doom feel but it’s very minuscule within the overall sound. Lead guitar work is used well in a long drawn out instrumental section that lasts until the tracks completion, with the abrupt change giving Blood Ceremony a somewhat progressive feel to them.

The second track, Coven Tree, is a completely different affair to the first, as this is where the flute comes into play. The flute parts play a very important part in the sound of Living With the Ancients, as it is used often in the place where other bands may have included a lead guitar line. Here the flute is used to create a very much folk feel to the track. I like the atmosphere it creates as well, as it has a real air of sadness to it, but with a few hints of happiness as well.

It’s very clear that even just two tracks in that Blood Ceremony’s Living With the Ancients is going to be an album that is difficult to accurately tag, as there’s a lot of different elements in the music here, though the more I listen to this the less I get the association with doom metal, though it certainly has its moments such as My Demon Brother and Oliver Haddo. If I were to put it in any metal genre it would be folk metal though, mainly because of that flute which dominates many of the tracks, such as Coven Tree and The Hermit, but also Night of Augury, which retains the same sort of folk feel by use of the usually psychedelic sounding organ, although like The Great God Pan before it, this one has an abrupt change of pace and turns into full on psychedelic rock, with some quite haunting sounds that kind of remind me of Pink Floyd in another of the band’s long drawn out instrumental sections. Some more folksy flutes are heard in the epic final track, Daughter of the Sun, which is easily one of, if not the best on the entire album.

For the most part I’d consider this a psychedelic/progressive rock release, which tracks such as Morning of the Magicians firmly establish. It is borderline being metal because the guitars are generally heavy, but as I hinted at above, it’s more metal in a retro, Black Sabbath-y sort of sense than it is a modern sense, which is where I guess the doom association comes from. No matter what direction the band takes a track in though, it remains strong, and Living With the Ancients is overall a great and highly recommendable release. Fans of retro sounds are especially advised to check this one out!

(Originally written for Heavy Metal Haven, scoring 8.8/10)