Review THRONEHAMMER “Slay | Kill | Erase”

Geographically speaking, almost 1,400 kilometers separate Fürth in Germany from Durham in England. When measured in metal spirit, however, that distance shrinks to zero. Thronehammer are living proof that borders mean very little when the music speaks the same language.

The band is the brainchild of Stuart West, who started Thronehammer as a project in 2012. What followed has turned into a steadily growing discography, with things really picking up toward the end of the 2010s.

One of the band’s defining traits is a sound that refuses to fit neatly into a single genre. It draws from several corners of heavy music, with Kat Shevil Gillham’s barking vocals providing a clear connection to death metal. On the other side of the spectrum are those heavy, slow-moving riffs, often stretched across considerable lengths and firmly rooted in doom and epic metal. Put the two together and you get a sound that is both intense and distinctly Thronehammer.

Three years after the release of Kingslayer, the band now has another full-length ready to roll. Slay | Kill | Erase arrives with eight tracks, once again giving Thronehammer plenty of room to let their riffs breathe.

One of the album’s most striking features is the sheer density of its sound. At the same time, the band keeps changing the scenery, as “Rise of Resistance” demonstrates. Clocking in at more than eleven minutes, it is one of the record’s longer pieces, but the running time never feels like an obstacle. Instead, the song combines a heavy, melancholic foundation with layers of atmosphere that occasionally recall the classic era of bands such as Candlemass. The three-guitar attack certainly plays its part, adding serious weight to the album’s riff-driven core.

Thronehammer stay true to their musical foundation throughout the record, but they keep reshaping the details around it. The result is a natural flow that carries the listener through all 73 minutes without the album becoming a one-dimensional exercise in heaviness.

Slay | Kill | Erase doesn’t exactly tiptoe into your ears. It moves with relentless weight, like a monolith slowly rolling toward you, gathering presence with every meter. Once you hit ”Play’, there’s little chance of escaping its pull. Hypnotic riffs and a deep sense of melancholy take hold almost immediately, and even after the final notes of the closer, “Onwards to Oblivion,” have faded away, the album continues to linger.