EPK – Shroud of Despondency/LanzerRath Split (2024) (Northern Spire Productions)
Publicist – Jon Asher – jon[@]ashermediarelations[.]com
“From Michigan’s desolate reaches, two decades apart, Shroud of Despondency and LanzerRath unite here in an unholy union of cosmic black metal.”
For fans of Emperor, Enslaved, Root, Thorns, Sigh
https://www.facebook.com/shroudofdespondency | https://ShroudofDespondency.bandcamp.com
“Shroud has always struck a fine balance between black metal’s esoteric and progressive bookends; in addition to the skin-searing atonality and machine gun riffing inherent to the genre, the band has made it a commonality to include tasteful strains of classical, Americana and folk, not to mention thrash, doom and death metal, in their sound. Basically, I was amazed they still hadn’t had someone’s dotted line thrust in front of their faces, especially in light of 1) the black metal genre’s historical open-armed acceptance of everyone from Emperor and Vattnet Viskar to Abruptum and Panopticon, and 2) the shitloads of crap out there that gets passed off as ‘essential listening.’”- Decibel
“From top to bottom, from the beginning of the first track until the last note of the fifth and final song of the album, Air of Abrasion is simply brilliant. It’s such a wild ride of an album, with literally the first 3/5ths of the album bringing such a visceral and stunning quality, to the last two tracks showcasing an emotive and musical talent that is flat out levelling on a whole new plane, or at least that elusive plane of musical identity and awareness that few artists actually achieve. I get the feeling that no matter if Shroud of Despondency sold 100 records or 100 million records, their writing and output would still be of the same quality and magnitude.” – Teeth of the Divine
“And that brings me to the second ingredient — the instrumental music on the album. It’s a match for the lyrics. This is one of the year’s bleakest, blackest, most bombastic albums — it’s emotionally wrenching, but it’s so well-executed that it’s transfixing. Rory Heikkila explained that for this final Shroud of Despondency album he purged various influences that had seeped into the project over the years since he started it:
“It needed to be unarguably a Black Metal album and it needed to do away with certain other elements that had crept in over the years. Death metal, progressive metal, and acoustic folk music were largely forsaken because black metal is still probably the most emotive form of music a person with my disposition can create.”
The music is dissonant and dire, with riffs that lash and spiral off in deranged tangents. It’s intense and dramatic. It builds tension like a ratchet torquing bolts to the breaking point. The keyboard orchestrations (at least I think synthesizers are what I’m hearing) build like thunderheads and then explode, with torrents of sound that come down like a deluge, backed by the accompanying howl of wind and the boom of thunder.” – No Clean Singing
[Download Split Cover | Download Lyrics]
Title: Shroud of Despondency/LanzerRath Split
Label: Northern Spire Productions
Release Date: May 10, 2024
Track Listing:
1. Shroud of Despondency – The Source of Multiversal Degradation – 10:43
2. Shroud of Despondency – Celestial Vencom – 9:52
3. LanzerRath – Nebular Collapse, The Dissolution of Order and Meaning
Shroud of Despondency tracks credits are as follows:
Rory Heikkila-all instruments and clean vocals
Ron Blemberg-all harsh vocals
Danny Washburn-additional vocals
The Shroud of Despondency portion of the split was written and recorded by Rory Heikkila in 2023.
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About The Split Artwork
We wanted something cosmic-themed.
About the Split album as a whole (LYRICALLY & MUSICALLY)
Shroud of Despondency part of the split focuses on an outward expansion into the cosmos of negative energy that wreaks havoc on all creation wherever it ends up.
Track by track (LYRICALLY & MUSICALLY) for Shroud of Despondency
1. The Source of Multiversal Degradation is a song about the origin of a collection of negative energy(doubt, hate, repression, etc) that forms into a physical entity and then expands out into the universe/multiverse to terrorize whoever it comes into contact with.
2. Celestial Venom concerns the expansion and of this force.
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Fun Fact from Shroud of Despondency:
Shroud of Despondency prides itself on being unpredictable and remains concerned only with the artistic process. While previous albums have focused primarily on dying, death, entropy, and the despair that comes with life, in its current state it is taking a more science fiction approach to these topics. This split and an upcoming full length continue what was started on 2016’s full length, “Of Origin, Conflict, and Recurrence”, in that it sees these negative energies as taking physical form in host bodies and wreaking havoc.
L-R – Rory Heikkila (all instruments), Ron Blemberg (vocals)
Shroud of Despondency was formed in the mid-late 90s in Upper Michigan by Rory Heikkila and has remained a highly active and unpredictable project ever since. While lineups and collaborations occur ever so often, the project’s two main contributors remain Rory Heikkila(instruments) and Ron Blemberg (vocals). This album has Shroud of Despondency collaborating on a split with Michigan’s black metal band LanzerRath. From Michigan’s desolate reaches, two decades apart, Shroud of Despondency and LanzerRath unite here in an unholy union of cosmic black metal.
Discography:
2024 – Shroud of Despondency/LanzerRath split
2022 – Air of Abrasion full length
2021 – Goodnight, My Kitten full length
2020 -Brumation full length
2020 – Runway Fatigue and Descriptions of Teeth full length
2020 – The Silent Note of the Coldest Night full length
2019 – Befouled by the Sacred double album
2018 – Cull full length
2016 – Of Origin, Conflict, and Recurrence full length
2016 – Moon from the Mountain full length
2015 – The Beast’s Desire to Sacrifice full length
2015 – Family Tomb full length
2014 – Tied to a Dying Animal double album
2012 – Pine full length
2011 – Objective:Isolation full length
2011 – Dark Meditations in Monastic Seclusion full length
2022 – For Eternity Brings No Hope full length
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