Doubtless you’ve heard the name Abigail Williams by now – some of it hype, some of it curiosity given the band’s former incarnation as brutal-yet-melodic death-metal act Vehemence. A constantly rotating line-up, several moves around the country and a brief break-up have likely put the band through a number of trials (those of you familiar with The Crucible get two points for recognizing that pun), but their full-length debut is finally here. And it’s on Candlelight, no slouch for signing quality acts.

Some reviews have denounced Abigail Williams‘ sound as nothing more than an attempt to wed black metal with the popular ‘core movement that’s infected many a US death metal act, but I don’t hear that at all. This is straight-up symphonic black, delivered at blazing speed and with a heavy dose of keyboard orchestration. The keys are going to be the most talked-about element here – more on those in a bit.

Although the Cradle of Filth/Danny Elfman intro fails to surprise or excite, the main riff of “World Beyond” does quite the opposite – it’s a genuinely vicious assault, sampling from blistering black/death like Zyklon and Myrkskog as much as expected acts like Anthems-era Emperor or Dark Funeral. More impressive, frenzied riffs await in tracks like “Into the Ashes” and “Empyrean.” Combined with a pulverizing blizzard of percussion and Ken Sorceron’s terrific vocal performance (halfway between Naglfar‘s Jens Ryden and Ihsahn), they’re enough to wipe away any shouts of Hot Topic pandering. The album even strikes a touch of unexpected class by enlisting what sounds like Solefald‘s Cornelius for some clean vocals on the title track; if this is actually Sorceron again, even more impressive.

However, despite all these successful elements working together, it’s the keys that frequently reduce the album to yet another Dimmu Borgir clone, albeit a good one. It’s not that the orchestration is poorly played – quite the contrary. When symphonic swells are used, usually as an undercurrent to the storm raging on the surface, it’s fine. There’s a lot of piano though, and so what is supposed to come off as grand, majestic and terrifying winds up feeling cute and cliché instead. In slower interludes the piano is acceptable, and when it switches up to a sci-fi warble (“A Thousand Suns”) or kitschy haunted-house organs (“Acolytes”) it sounds a bit fresher too. However, given the ferocity of the riffs, I think the band would do well to stick to a more urgent and chaotic symphonic attack. See Anorexia Nervosa‘s Redemption Process for a great example of a more maniacal and feverish orchestration – it makes the tinkly piano here sound precious by comparison.

While it’s true that Abigail Williams may be many fans’ initiation into black metal (rather than recommended gateway drugs like Anthems or Diabolical Fullmoon Mysticism), I don’t hear anything that trendy about this. What I hear is a group of very talented musicians who obviously love the genre and wanted to pay homage to some of their favorite acts (right down to the Necrolord-inspired cover art). Now that they’ve gotten all that out of the way, I look forward to hearing an album which tosses out some of the more tired elements and works at forging an even stronger identity.

[Visit the band's website]

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