siLLy puPPy As a side project of Oathbreaker members Gilles Demolder (bass) and Wim Coppers / Sreppoc (drums), the black metal project WIEGEDOOD has actually surpassed the former in number of albums released. This Ghent, Belgium based trio also features vocalist / guitarist Levy Seynaeve of the bands Amenra, Black Haven and Hessian (A.D.). WIEDGEDOOD formed in 2014 and released an atmospheric black metal trilogy titled “De Doden Hebben Het Goed” which forged fierce yet haunting black metal soundscapes with atmospheric cascades of sound.

Four years on WIEGEDOOD has jettisoned all traces of atmospheric smoothness and opted to crank out the ultimate slab of pure musical rage on its fourth full-length THERE’S ALWAYS BLOOD AT THE END OF THE ROAD with a frenetic fast paced energetic delivery that declares war on all creation with one of the most frenetic assaults of black metal fury i’ve experienced in a long time. For whatever reason WIEGEDOOD has decided it’s going for the gold in the black metal olympics with incessantly rampaging black metal vehemence at breakneck speeds that pummel the senses and leave all but the most dedicated devotees of punishing extreme metal in utter ruin.

With the fury of Mayhem and the energetic drive of contemporary tech death metal bands, WIEGEDOOD (which apparently means ‘crib death” minus one letter) generates a suffocating display of black metal wrath that keeps its roots in the occulted underground with dense distorted guitar riffs chugging along at the speed of light, terrifying jangled guitar distortion and blastbeat bass and drum orotundity designed to destroy everything within its tumultuous reach. The perfect balance between melodic runs and atonal angularities offers a unique tension not common in modern black metal as well as moments of diversion into eerie even darkly psychedelic passages that don’t rely on keyboards but rather strange chord progressions and off-kilter time signature deviations.

“FN SCAR 16” hits the ground running with a furious uproar of pure black metal rage complete with whizzing instrumentation and lunatic vocal screams. Everything is on steroids and caffeine and cocaine and pretty much everything else. Oh, and Mercury seems to be in perpetual retrograde and the sun stopped shining and the zombie apocalypse is upon us and everyone is just sooooo fucked! You catch my drift. This is about as head banging of black metal as you could ever hope for but there are scant moments when the metal is allowed to drop out to bring us some bizarre inter dimensional static of some sort. The album also utilizes the art of amp feedback and implements various guitars for extra effects.

While totally extreme all the time may sound like a recipe for monotonous ennui, WIEGEDOOD are masters at spicing shit up with varying riffing strategies, dynamic instrumental interplay and above average musicianship that allows for fascinating drum rolls, guitar workouts and even Levy Seynaeve’s blood curdling screams display more variation than the average black metal vocalist on perpetual puke mode. THERE’S ALWAYS BLOOD AT THE END OF THE ROAD pretty much offers everything i love about the extremest sectors of the black metal universe! Aggression, weirdness and a battle between melodic forces and chaotic atonal dissonance. There’s even moments of throat singing and the album delivers an unrelenting tension that offers enough variety to sustain it all the way through. Brilliant!

adg211288 Formed in 2014 and releasing their debut album De doden hebben het goed (2015) (The dead are doing well) a year later, Wiegedood (meaning Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) are still a relatively new entry on the atmospheric black metal scene. Hailing from Belgium and consisting of a three-piece line-up that includes two members of Oathbreaker, De doden hebben het goed II (2017) is, as you may have guessed from the title, their second album and a direct counterpart to their debut.

Structured in a very similar fashion to their debut as a four track atmospheric black metal album, De doden hebben het goed II is a relatively short jaunt, lasting only about thirty-three minutes. The individual tracks run for a mid to reasonable long length each, the shortest being finale Smeekbede at 6:13 and the longest being second track Cataract at 11:11. The band's style is considerably more standardised atmospheric black metal fare compared to what guitarist Gilles Demolder and drummer Wim Sreppoc play in their other band Oathbreaker (at least from their latest album Rheia (2016), as their used to be more hardcore/crust punk based), but they and frontman Levy Seynaeve (bass in atmospheric sludge metal act Amenra) nevertheless impress well enough with their take on the genre. The record is not groundbreaking but they produce a solid effort, especially on the first two of the four tracks, Ontzielling and Cataract. The trio obviously know their stuff.

The trouble with the record is that after the first impressions have worn off it's all too easy to realise that other than being 'very well done' it doesn't actually have all that much going for it as an album. That no doubt seems a contradiction but allow me to explain: It is well done, but it's also a rather generic atmospheric black metal release. It's the kind of album that's easy to enjoy if you are a fan of the genre but if your interest is of a more casual nature then it's easy for me to hear how De doden hebben het goed II could come across as being 'just another album' from a scene that is, let's be fair, rather crowded with artists.

It might help the album's case if Levy Seynaeve's blackened screams weren't of the completely indiscernible kind so there were some lyrical references to hook onto which may have made it easier to recall which track was which, because give me a half hour after the album has finished playing and the only thing I can say was definitely a part of a certain song is the final drawn out scream in Smeekbede that brings the album to a close and I'm actually unsure if that's because it is the last moment on the album so freshest in my head or if it's because that last scream actually sounds a bit ridiculous.

The point is that in any genre it's all well and good being able to craft music that fits the industry standard and even do it well, as De doden hebben het goed II actually does for most of the album. Wiegedood certainly display stronger musicianship and professionalism in their recording than the majority of newer black metal acts. But an artist needs that extra something to make them really stand out and based on the evidence presented here I do not believe that Wiegedood have found that yet.