Rating: 7.0

Country: USA

Release Date: 2007

Record Label: Profound Lore

Track list:
1. Projections
2. Sin Continuum
3. Virulence 33
4. Southaven
5. Stealth Engencis
6. Forced into the Pits of Technology
7. Deadlands
8. The Inevitable Conclusion

Total playing time 46:41

Band Website: The Howling Wind

The Howling Wind - Pestilence and Peril

Killusion (Ryan Lipynsky) - guitar/bass/vocals
Parasitus - drums

There's a nearby mansion-turned-museum built for a secretary of war who moved to this state in 1795. It's a dry, but reasonably attractive tourist destination, as well as a local source of pride for many wrinkled patriots. However, at night, the town's lights illuminate pillars of smog pouring from a cement plant directly behind the mansion, creating an image that's sincerely ugly, and paradoxically, stunning. I'd venture to say there's an abstract beauty in this early antique of colonialism silhouetted by a towering, sky-raping testament to rapid industrialization. My mind was wrapped in these musings while listening to Pestilence & Peril by The Howling Wind, the latest project of Ryan Lipynsky, of whom I was until now unfamiliar. This album achieves a similar effect by paralleling two elements that are similar in intent, yet utterly different in form, with a deafeningly industrial-tinted interpretation of classic black metal.

Like fellow American black metallers Negative Plane, The Howling Wind twist the decrepit niche to which they adhere into all sorts of bizarre shapes, without lowering their artistic sensibilities to humor black metal purists, nor digressing from the genre's fundamental principles enough to be called anything but black metal upon first listen by all but the most astute listeners. For the most part, the riffs calling Pestilence & Peril home are primitive power chords reminiscent of Cult of Daath. There's a certain sparseness present, with lots of crusty arrangements being spread around well past their expiration dates (some of these songs do drag), but I dare say they tend to pick up a certain momentum even while on the verge of becoming tiresome. While there are enough Bathoryisms to please the most disillusioned oldschooler, Pestilence & Peril isn't entirely unconscious of modern black metal; the song "Virulence 33" would be at home on Nachtmystium's last album (sans the latter's psychedelic wanking).

The general theme of the album seems to be a study of the contrast between these urgent chord progressions, and claustrophobic arcs of shimmering noise & industrial clatter. At times Pestilence & Peril leans more towards the former with shuffling Apocalyptic Raids antiquities of riffs, and at times leans closer towards the latter with the dreamy noisescape of the interlude "Southhaven," and the hellish ambient industrial closer, "The Inevitable Conclusion." Both cases are adequate, if a bit hollow, but the album really works when they're combined, as in the case of the song "Forced Into the Pits of Technology." This ten minute composition of subtly shifting riff and drum patterns ornamented with noisy, Godflesh-esque squeals of lead guitar molestation streaks by in a flash (a statement admittedly contradicting my quip about how the songs occasionally lag; this is an album of paradoxes), an extremely good sign. I have nothing but the deepest disdain for artists who artificially pad out otherwise good material for the sole virtue of creating an "epic."

Ryan Lipynsky hacks out technophobic lyrics with the scabby, fuzzed out, static-drowned screams that are now so prominent in USBM. I'm not too fond of this vocal style, as its artificiality irks me, but that's a minor gripe. Another flaw is the bass guitar's lifelessness, which is borderline comatose. Underpinning the music is delightfully sloppy percussion that, as with most black metal, doesn't try to provide much more than pounding scaffold when blasting. However, during the groovier bits the skinpounding becomes more interesting, as they allow drummer Parasitus the time to flesh out and indulge in chaotic, metallic splashes of hi-hat and ride cymbal abuse not unlike Dimhymn's unique brand of percussive "talent." The manner in which some of the discordant Norwegian black metal 101 passages are rendered semi-audible background dissonance is also well done, as it exalts them from mere Darkthrone paraphrases to an essential part of the harsh, swelling layers of unkempt noise that make the album so involving.

Not bad, ladies and gentlemen. Overall, Pestilence & Peril is an album of boiling potential, as well as strong evidence that there's still fine American black metal to be heard before the apocalypse. Recommended.

November 25th, 2007