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Araphel - The Endchanter
Out now via @nuclearwar - Araphel’s The Endchanter marks a rare debut that feels both ancient and newly awakened. Rooted in the black metal traditions of early Rotting Christ and Varathron, the Italian quartet’s first full length transforms epic heavy metal structures into philosophical ruin. Led by former Demonomancy drummer Santo, Araphel strip the genre of excess, revealing something austere, ritualistic rather than performative.
The record opens with the title track, a seven minute invocation of destruction and divinity. Its lyrics “This must be what it is like to be a God, beholder of an expired creation” set the tone of grandeur collapsing into ash. “Old Comet Transition” reimagines transcendence as exile, a journey away from the crowd toward inner singularity. “Elysian Fields Ablaze” burns theology and empire alike, turning myth into indictment. Across the album, melody serves as lament, not beauty with each riff a scar drawn over faith.
Production is raw & gives weight to the bass and clarity to Santo’s rasping vocals. Guitars shimmering between Greek austerity and northern aggression, recalling the precision of Thy Mighty Contract with the spiritual desolation of Bathory’s later work.
“The Song of Araphel” closes the album with conviction, self forged, triumphant, almost sacred in its defiance. By then, the band has circled its central question, what remains when belief, empire, and meaning dissolve?
Araphel’s vision is not nostalgic but corrective, black metal as an act of reclamation, of thought reclaimed from ruin. It is disciplined, literate, and entirely without illusion. In a genre drowning in mimicry, The Endchanter stands as a reminder that black metal’s highest form is not chaos but clarity through destruction.
9/10
Words by @FuegoCasa
In collaboration with @HeadbangersAustralia