'Law of the Rope' - which premieres here today with a creepy as fuck video (and will appear on their upcoming fourth LP The Monuments of Ash & Bone) - starts with a blast riff, coming on hard and fast before switching into the familiar Ildjarn beat at half tempo later and then a doom-influenced section that shows the boys know all manner of hatred. Olympia, Washington, black-metal crew Wolvhammer understand this and it's one of the things that makes them so compelling - their focused, mid-tempo riffing still screams 'we hate you' and they clearly realize that variance in tempo and approach is the key to keeping things interesting. But the technique has lost a lot of its luster due to sheer overuse.
Sure, they're an impressive feat and have the ability to sound unrelenting and just plain evil for a short period of time. There's something decidedly un-terrifying, and almost conventional, about blast beats in 2018.
