Album Review: Moonlight Sorcery – Horned Lord of the Thorned Castle

Intro:

Based in Finland, Moonlight Sorcery is a formidable force to be reckoned with. This music embodies the dark fantasy of ancient mythology and old faerie tale fables. Demonic dragons, evil witches, cruel monarchs, and crumbling castles set the backdrop for the epic sweeping melodies. Like the folk tales of yore, it is intriguing and fascinating, but also has a certain mysterious morbidity about it. Let’s got lost in the wild wicked woods, and confront the big bad wolf together! 

Album Review:

Each and every single last song on this album is stellar. But The Secret of Streaming Blood especially struck my fancy. The drumming is consistently hard and heavy throughout the whole album, but particularly on this specific track. In a similar vein,the galloping guitar riffs and groovy bass lines remind me of classic Iron Maiden. But the lyrics and vocals are considerably heavier. 

The soaring screams and gutteral growls sound like a real life monster. If hippogriffs, manticores, and chimeras actually did, or ever will, truly exist, then this is what they would probably sound like. This ambitious debut full length album, breathes life to the cryptozoology of medieval manuscripts and bestiaries. I feel like I’m wandering through the pages of an illuminated grimoire. I have truly tapped into some kind of ancestral magick. 

I knew I had stumbled across something special, like a wandering troubadour discovering a buried treasure chest full of cursed gold. The lyrics love nature, but hate humanity. The juxtaposed dichotomy of peaceful bliss and bitter misanthropy, is oddly relatable. This is a concept album, containing a complete story, with a distinct beginning, middle, and end. The plot follows the characters, and culminates into an epic climax. 

I apologize in advance for my vulgarity, but have you ever experienced a musical euphoria, so pure, that it’s almost literally orgasmic? “Oh, yeah, baby. That’s some good solo right there…Unf! You know exactly what I like!”

Another apt metaphor, is the mental, emotional, and physical high of drugs. One of these days, I’ll be jonesing for my daily dose, banging on the band’s door at exactly 2:17 AM mountain standard time, scratching at the imaginary spiders and invisible centipedes crawling up and down my arms, eyelids involuntarily twitching, and muscles convulsing, as I beg: “Hey man you got any more of those uhh sick ass dissonant guitar tones? I only need a little bit more! Just one fix!” 

Outro:

The band are faster than a bullet and louder than hell, but they also aren’t afraid to sustain a sonorous note and really make it sing! The resulting harmonic dynamics are equal parts brutal, and beautiful. Some songs are energetic and rowdy. Others are thoughtful and pensive. All are deeply, extremely emotional. Whether the feeling be confidence, anger, sorrow, disgust, loneliness, or anything else, they express it with true passion and vivid sincerety. 4 stars outta 5!