PlanetMosh Keeping it Metal
Hailing from Londonderry in Northern Ireland, MOTH have built a decent following on the local live scene. Unfortunately they have not been able to transfer this energy and theatricality to tape.
There are very obvious My Dying Bride, Paradise Lost and Cradle of Filth influences from the image down to the riffs.
This would be better touted as a demo rather than a full blown release due to the underwhelming production values: it sounds haphazard and thrown together. It is a shame because the songs themselves have plenty going for them.
‘Abbey and the Oakwood’ has a moody clean intro before descending into a crushing slow riff which brings back memories of early Paradise Lost. ‘Dead Can Dance’ carries on in a dark doom metal vein with splashes of blast beats and Dani Filth vocal histrionics.
From the five tracks that are presented, ‘Dreadful Hollow’ has it all in the right places, slow brooding doom metal with the dark overtones of the likes of Katatonia, even a touch of Marilyn Manson. The band seems to be more comfortable in this area; with the song sounding more fluent and complete.
The band appears to be trying to be all things to all men and it is taking focus of their stronger traits. This is really no more than a demo and the band should be treating this as such: they need to step back and focus in on their strengths and take more time and care with the next recording.
They have built a following and put the effort into their live shows – now they need to do the same with their recordings.
4/10
Track list:
1. Abbey And The Oakwood
2. Dead Can Dance
3. Dreadful Hollow
4. She Is Death
5. Succubus My Serpentine
‘Wonderer From the Nightly Shore’ is out now and available to stream/download from http://mourningoftheheretic.bandcamp.com/album/wonderer-from-the-nightly-shore-e-p
Review by David McCallum
