Year: 2021
Label: Werewolf Records
Rating: 7,8 / 10
Let me remind you, dear readers, that THORNSPAWN is an old US band that recently celebrated its 30th anniversary. THORNSPAWN has existed in the deep underground for most of these 30 years, although it had its moments – for example, one of the albums was released on Osmose and even licensed here in the CIS. In 2011, the band turned into some kind of American LUCIFUGUM when the head of THORNSPAWN brought his wife Hella into line-up. This woman is a tireless activist of the underground front, nd I say this in a positive sense. She lways plays and participates somewhere (she even sang on the only release of Russian VHORTHAX), organizes something, has her own merchandise label, one of the newest releases of which is CAPRICORNUS / DER STÜRMER hoodie. Therefore, we can assume that the purity test has been passed; no fucking Daniel Lake from the most fashionable gay magazine Decibel would write about such people.
The split I'm currently reviewing is an extended version of the original cassette release, which contains several additional tracks. I have already written about THORNSPAWN, but that was a long time ago, so let me remind you – this is noisy and bomb-like metal hell that (again, in a positive sense) just screams "U-S-A". Although the musician admits that he was inspired to play guitar by Blackmoon of old DARK FUNERAL, in fact there is nothing European in his style. This is a cocky mixture of BLACK WITCHERY (in fast fragments) and PROFANATICA (in slow ones), plus vocals passed through the harmonizer (for some reason Americans like to do this, although almost always it makes the voice incredibly bad). This is sweaty, brutal, bloody and barbaric black metal of Satan. Great!
MALEDICTVS is THORNSPAWN in reverse. Here Hella writes music and plays most of the instruments, and her husband bangs on the drums. The differences in the sound of the two projects represent marital synergy in a most precise way: THORNSPAWN is about masculine heaviness, MALEDICTVS is about feminine sophistication and almost cat-like biting aggression, but in essence it is the same fast, vicious, intense black metal. I like MALEDICTVS a little more, because there are very catchy melodies with a glimpse of European character. But again, both projects are two sides of the same coin, and therefore we have one of the most wholistic splits in the world.
The verdict for the musical part of the whole split surprised even me: there is no originality and novelty here, not at all, but for some reason these riffs and tremolos, which I have heard a hundred million times performed by other bands, work here again. Probably, the secret is in the unfeigned passion and the true loyalty to Black Metal. In addition, a cover of HELLHAMMER has also never spoiled any release. Give it a listen.
English (UK) 
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