Full album stream: Barghest - Self-Titled

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This is the full stream for Barghest’s self-titled album. It is now out on vinyl as a joint release by Gilead Media and Howling Mine, a label owned by Thou vocalist Bryan Funck. The sound has been remastered for vinyl; the result is a little smoother and more “pro”-sounding than the cassette demo, which is floating around the Internet. (See also comments in our recent post on mixing & mastering).

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Barghest – Self-Titled [full album stream]
[audio: BARGHEST_STREAM.mp3]

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It strikes me that now when people review extreme metal, the highlights are always the deviations from the template. For fast music (grindcore, black metal), those highlights are slow parts. (Are slow songs the only grindcore songs anyone remembers?) For slow music (doom), it’s fast parts. And for death metal, it’s, well, anything else. Have extreme metal’s templates gotten so worn out that what’s really interesting is anything but them?

I thought that while hearing Barghest’s record. Actually, I like it quite a bit. (You can read Chris Rowella’s review here). It fits in with what I like about a lot of American black metal – raw, punky, sometimes unpretentious. Parts also capture the depth and melancholy that the Norwegians did so well. But I can pinpoint exactly when my ears perk up. The third song has a gorgeously painful doom section; the fourth song is a lovely, Burzum-esque ambient interlude; and the last two songs have some gnarly death metal.

Are we done with “tremolo picking minor chords over blastbeats with screechy vocals” as a template? I’m still not convinced that any band can do that better than prime-time Mayhem and Darkthrone.

But I’m convinced that bands can go beyond. I look forward to what Barghest do next. They have ideas. Now they just need vision.

In the meantime, their album is now out on 180g vinyl. All orders from Gilead Media come with a 3″ x 5″ patch and a 1″ metallic button.

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ORDER BARGHEST LP FROM GILEAD MEDIA

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