Hailing from the somewhat sunnier plane of Pennsylvania, the heavy metals wraiths of Morgul Blade had already summoned their debut album ‘Fell sorcery Abounds’  three years ago on No Remorse Records. Now comes the fantastically monikered follow up on the same label. Lyrically inspired by Tolkien’s tales of Middle Earth, the songs themselves find the middle ground between classic heavy metal and melodic black metal.

Opener ‘Eagle Strike’ is a perfect example of this.  Built around a structure of epic heavy metal like it was made in the eighties, it pulls in black metal screams since Nazgul obviously don’t have falsetto voices or anything.

In fact, I’m of reminded of the Rotting Christ’s most melodic album from the nineties ‘A Dead Poem’, which I consider an unfairly underrated gem, so I make this comparison with the greatest of compliments in mind.

The bass heavy intro on ‘Beneath Black Wings’ sounds so stadium rock it could be a could be an old Whitesnake track, until some sulphurous black metal guitar hisses seep in through the cracks. It sounds like a combination that should be doomed to fail, but ultimately it really works and is so much fun to listen to.

The title track, besides being a fitting description of the album’s intent, it is also another alloy of up-tempo eighties speed metal riffs in a blackened vocabulary. ‘Frostwyrm Cavalry’ goes a bit deeper into hellish territory as it even starts out with a proper blast beat.

Proving further, that they are not a one trick poltergeist that happen chanced on this success formula in an abandoned troll cave, ‘Widow’s Lament’ breaks up the record. This is a straight-up folk tune to be sung in a seedy tavern commemorating fallen heroes.

‘Spider God’ and ‘Razor Sharp’ unsheathe relentless flurries of erm… razor sharp twin guitar assaults, rounded off with a synthy trip to the dungeon. With  ‘A Welcome Hearth’ they nest a bit deeper into those deep and damp dungeons. Or does it. It sounds all quite comfy synth’ actually, creating an oddly warm, fuzzy feeling. Hey, Nazgul need hugs too sometimes.

With ‘Neither Cross nor Crime’ the heavy metal wraiths cross steel once more as spears splinter and shields shatter under their mighty riffs.  ‘The Last in a Line of Kings’ closes the record with another dungeon synth driven composition.

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