Warthur Ugh, what is going on with the production here? Normally it'd be an oxymoron to say that the guitars are too overbearing on a metal release but they really are here, dominating the mix to the point where Vicky's vocals are almost entirely lost. On top of that, what I can hear of the drum sound seems kind of thin - it's almost as though they couldn't get a take they like on the drums, and then tried to mix the guitars in such a way as to cover that up, but ended up covering up everything else too. Vicky left the band before this and in all honesty that seems like a good call, because this is just embarrassingly clumsy at points.

Case in point: the title track is a (again badly mixed) acoustic interlude between tracks, a throwaway instrumental based mostly around aimless acoustic guitar strumming that seems to exist mostly for filler purposes. It's pretty enough - in fact, it's probably the best track on the album - but when you can say that such lazy filler is the best bit of the release, that's pretty bad, and when the band don't have the confidence in any of the more developed tracks to name the album after one of them but can't be assed to think up a title that isn't a title of one of the songs, that makes it look like they are phoning it in. Sad.

Warthur A decent doom metal album from this female-fronted band that included Christian Lietch of Warning, which is how my interest got piqued in the first place. However, rather than the truly monolithic slabs of despair Warning trade in, here the sound feels lukewarm and diluted, with Vicky Walters' vocals the main saving grace of the release. If you need a doom fix it will tide you over, but if you have any Warning or Electric Wizard or Sub Rosa handy you're likely to find those more satisfying in the long run unless you find yourself especially enchanted by Vicky's delivery of these gloomy-guts lyrics.