Temple of Void’s metamorphosis from an orthodox, bone-crushing death/doom outfit to a wildly adventurous death-doom outfit, one unafraid of incorporating unconventional influences, has been quite the musical journey: A journey that I’ve been lucky enough to document firsthand. For it was back in March, 2020, in the midst of global pandemic, that ToV unveiled their “new” sound, so to speak, with The World That Was. 2022’s Summoning the Slayer expanded even further upon this direction, which subsequently lead to a schism within the underground. Personally, I was all for it, and I’ve got the timestamped reviews to back it up. Now, ToV returns with what might be their most ambitious effort to date, The Crawl.
After a few years of laying rather low, Temple of Void emerge from the crypt with a 7 song offering of death/doom which, if I’m being completely honest, only feels like a death/doom album in spirit alone. Sure, you’ve got no shortage of musical nods to ’90s death metal, and the riffs themselves are bleak as hell. Isn’t that all one needs to constitute a death/doom record? Usually, yes. However, in the case of The Crawl, the songs themselves, in terms of the way their arrangements unfold and their atmosphere is laid out, are executed in a progressive manner à la Opeth, and I’m certainly not complaining.
The opening “Poison Icon” sets the tone for this grim affair, capturing that old school Peaceville sound by fusing headbanging death metal, gothic sheen, and hard rocking attitude all into one. It’s death metal that you can play for your normie friend who listens to rock radio, yet without ever sacrificing the intensity of true old school death metal. The same can be said for “Godless Cynic”, whose riffs and rhythms veer on the edge of death ‘n’ roll era Carcass. Ironically, the title track is the deadliest on the album, honing in on that bleak, miserable brand of death/doom reminiscent of cult legends Winter or Monotheist era Celtic Frost. True to its title, it is a slow, painful crawl of a cut, but with extra hefty riffage.
From here, things get weird. With its blatant ’70s progressive rock leaning in arrangement and instrumentation (Did somebody reanimate Richard Wright to lay down keys?), the hypnotic “A Dead Issue” might be my favorite ToV song to date. “Thy Mountain Eternal” doubles down on these prog maneuvers, melding traditional death/doom with a lengthy arrangement and more lush keys. Perhaps they’ll follow the footsteps of Crypt Sermon and hire a full time keyboardist in the future? Come the rumbling ’90s goth romanticism of “Soulburn” (another cut with “hit” potential) and ferocious “The Twin Stranger”, the latter another exercise in death/doom with an emphasis on “death”, It becomes more than apparent that ToV are NOT a unit to be toyed with.
While both The World That Was and Summoning the Slayer showed great potential for a “new and improved” Temple of Void (not that there was anything wrong with the OG one), The Crawl is a true proclamation of where the band as we know it stands in 2026. The songs are wild and adventurous, yet without ever feeling disjointed or uneven, and even the cohesion feels stronger than before. Indeed, Temple of Void have reached a depth in the void that has yet to be explored properly by mankind, and maybe shouldn’t be…but of course, that never stopped us in the past. Heaven help us all.
8 out of 10
Label: Relapse Records
Genre: Death/Doom Metal
For fans of: Hooded Menace, Paradise Lost, Opeth
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