MURW — Kanker (review)

MURW — Kanker album cover Album · 2012 · Black Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
4/5 ·
UMUR
"Kanker" is the debut full-length studio album by Dutch black/death metal act Murw. The album was released through Heidens Hart Records in January 2012. Murw were founded in 1997 by most of the members of the now defunct Dutch death metal act Intestine and keyboard player/guitarist Wouter Klinkenberg who came from the Dutch black metal act Doncker.

The music on the 4 track, 37:40 minutes long album, is atmospheric, haunting and semi-progressive doomy death metal with an occasional blackened edge. The band mention early The Gathering and Paradise Lost among their influences and I would add acts like early Opeth and Katatonia to that equation as well as Virus/Ved Buens Ende because of the occasional use of twisted dissonant open chord riffing. the 4 tracks on the album all exceed the 7 minute mark and they are structurally challenging in addition to featuring a dark and haunting atmosphere. The vocals on the album are deep, brutal and predominantly unintelligible growls. There are various types of extreme metal vocals on the album though and some are more intelligible than others. There are also a clean vocal section in "De Buitenstaander", which works pretty well.

The musicianship is top notch and "Kanker" features an organic and well sounding production which brings out the best in the tracks. Overall this is a high quality release which I find highly recommendable to fans of semi-progressive atmospheric doom/death metal. A 4 star (80%) rating is deserved.
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