One of the joys of being a music scene deep diver is liking what you hear of a brand-spanking-new band’s demos and EPs, watching them sign to a label, and anticipating their debut full-length. The Austin, Texas death-doom outfit Void Witch caught my attention with their first demo in 2021. The songs were remarkably fleshed out for being a band’s first-ever output, and I enjoyed the funny little black-and-white illustration of a hooded figure with five legs all pointing to the side. We’ll call him Five Feets Francis. A couple years later I noticed that Everlasting Spew re-released that demo with an additional song and a new illustration in the same style. I call that guy Pope Alligator Hands the Third. This was a great sign, since Everlasting Spew already had death doom heavy hitters Convocation and Fossilization on their formidable roster, and they were hearing the same promise I was in Void Witch. Three years after that first demo sees the arrival of the band’s debut LP, Horripilating Presence.1 Has our faith in their abilities been well placed?
Opening track “Grave Mistake” seems to say “no,” but that’s just the title. Musically, it’s a bold statement of intent that grabs you with the first few dolorous notes and sudden dramatic lead guitars. It’s hard not to be all in on the style Void Witch crafted: death doom with all the heavy crunch and trudging pace of the genre’s usual tropes, but with generous doses of traditional heavy metal flair. This comes out in harmonized guitar leads and dexterous solos like those found on “Grave Mistake” and its bookend “Horripilating Presence,” but it’s also in the fun word pictures songs like “Supernova of Brain and Bone” and “Thousand Eyed Stalactite” paint. If you’re looking for touchstones there’s a bit of Worm and a bit of Hooded Menace in their sound, but Void Witch have their own flavor, partly due to the relatively clean production job for a style that is often intentionally murky.
Horripilating Presence by Void Witch
The demo impressed me with its confidence, but the material on Horripilating Presence is Mohamed Ali levels of confident. The editing of ideas in each song and across the album’s taut 39 minutes is masterful, especially for a debut. No song hews too closely to any of the others, but all are of a piece, locking comfortably into place like an intricate puzzle box, and Void Witch have such wonders to show you. The oscillation between morose foot-dragging, punchy gallops, and triumphant guitars make “Grave Mistake” one of the best songs I’ve heard in 2024. This record is all about the progressions, like the one on “Supernova of Bone and Brain” where a chugging stomp leads into an intricate solo before both fall off a cliff as the regal central riff from earlier in the song brings the things home. It’s hard to overstate the maturity of this record, which feels like the third or fourth release by an ascendant band.
One of the surest ways to impress me is to seamlessly integrate multiple influences and aural textures into compositions that flow like water across the path of least resistance, and that’s exactly what Void Witch does. A song like the closing title track is a masterclass in balancing slowly evolving atmosphere with hard-charging grooves and the kind of heaviness only death metal can bring. Elsewhere, “Malevolent Demiurge” and “Supernova…” peddle in the kind of stately riff craft made famous by Paradise Lost. No section outstays it’s welcome, no riff repeats one too many times, there’s the right ratio of weedly solos to thick slabs of murk. If I had one nitpick it would be that “Second Demon” is a step down from the other songs in memorability, but even that one grew on me over subsequent listens.
As much as it’s a reviewer’s job to dispassionately assess the successes and missteps artists make in their work, no one wants to see a band take their early promise, buff it till it gleams, and top it with a pretty bow more than we do, because we’re first and foremost fans of musicians. I’m very pleased to tell you Void Witch knocked it out of the park on their first at bat.
Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: 8 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps kbps mp3
Label: Everlasting Spew Records
Websites: voidwitchtx.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/voidwitchtx
Releases Worldwide: July 26th, 2024
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