Rating: 8.1

Country: Australia

Release Date: 2007

Record Label: Obsidian Records

Track list:
1. Priest
2. On Demon Wings
3. Twisting The Knife
4. Blood Of Ancients
5. Butchered
6. Ill Of The Dead
7. Disciples Of War
8. The Black Arts
9. And Then They Die
10. In Tongues
11. Burning Hatred

Total playing time 34:54

Band Website: Misery

Misery - On Demon Wings

Anthony Dwyer - Drums
Scott Edgar - Guitar
Damon Robinson - Bass, Vocals

Misery have always been an underappreciated death metal band. They have been active since 1991 and have released several albums including a supposedly acclaimed debut A Necessary Evil, but still the name draws a blank among metal fans. Some wannabe cool and knowledgeable fool might scream out late saying that he knows Misery, but that would be the crust band from US and not this one from Australia. I in fact owned a couple of their newer albums, Revel In Blasphemy and Curses, and while I might have been hasty, I don't particularly regret trading them away a few years back. I have very faint memories of the first one except that it was very noisy and chaotic with little lasting value, and I remember Curses to be a solid album packed with chunky riffs, some really good ones too, but overall it was dull and unoriginal. An optimistic fucker that I am (I'm forced to be when I have to review promos), I truly hoped for good things from On Demon Wings, Misery's final album.

And yes, praise the cow, On Demon Wings turns out to be a fine album. Misery have improved on so many aspects it's as if they had conducted a widely publicised poll or something prior to writing this album. The songs don't sound as derivative anymore, and the only influence that really sticks out is of Immolation, and that my mates is a great sign of virility. The music exudes dank darkness which spills out of your speakers, leaving the unsuspecting listener stunned and looking like the blackened victim of a bomb blast. The atmosphere is enveloping and nauseating, the production sounding closest to the rawish ‘inside-out' production on Failures for Gods. Misery's music moves in a grudging pace, sapping energy of people around it like a spoilt kid of the family throwing tantrums on his way to school. Damon's vocals here are comparable to Daniel Corchado's on Incantation's Diabolical Conquest, his sharp throaty growls of wide range and depth well capable of emitting negative feelings through them. So there you have all the refurbished elements to make a promising dark death metal album.

“Priest” wastes no time in drenching you with its sticky slime, playing dark twisted riffs in a dogged mid-pace that will make your stomach squirm and eventually revolt. “On Demon Wings” plunges you into a slow moaning Incantation-esque part, dragging you down with it in a spiralling descent like a crocodile clutching its prey in its jaws. The Slayer-inspired leads, which are thankfully less frantic, are very tastefully employed on this album. Over here they sound as if they are almost mocking, giggling like slutty girls, exposing more than they realise in their sloshed state. “Twisting the Knife” starts off robustly with a radical fucking riff section, before its progress is impeded by huge suffocating Here In After parts, after which the music quits struggling and adopts the entrancing epic approach of the same band while the anguished vocals go "Aaaaaaaa.." to create quite an excellent moment. The following two songs are heavily influenced by Failures for Gods, and have leads that tear through the music, like the opening of new portals through the terra firma. This is where Misery excels: they take the best elements of sublime bands and mix it into their music and place alongside chugging parts or titillating leads which maintain the same level and pace of the music and not fly around in the air with its nose turned up like a snob. Then, the next couple of songs have riffs that are interestingly reminiscent of Destroyer 666. By the time you get to the latter songs of the album, you find your attention waning, the choke-hold no longer in place. Unfortunately, the songs here, while still solid, seem frivolous and unnecessarily adventurous as opposed to the album's gloriously dark early ones.

On Demon Wings starts out extremely well but loses its way towards the end because perhaps in an attempt to do something different, Misery compose some unseemly tunes that belie the grave and morbid feel that this album is expected to exude all through. That aside, it is a very good album and easily Misery's strongest from the ones I've heard. While it is a shame that Misery have decided to call it quits, as I feel the band had yet to realise their full potential especially after getting a taste of what they have achieved on this album, it is a wise decision to do so when they are at their peak. I strongly urge fans of pure and dark death metal to seek out this fine death metal album. For listening to it will feel like being inextricably stuck in a mud pit, with venomous snakes coiling around your upper body and scaly roots tugging at your legs underneath, the horrific event unfolding under the pitch-black shadow of a dense mysterious forest.

June 13th, 2008