Amazon EsotericSinewy streams of unrelenting funeral doom come courtesy of veteran UK unit Esoteric via their latest offering, a two-disc, over 100 minute affair entitled THE MANIACAL VALE. Adorned with a twisted sense of ambience and an eerie aura that creeps into your head and takes control, this ambitious endeavor’s hypnotic waves of dissonance resonate with schizophrenic aggression played up by a vocal performance laden with ferocious growls and blood-curdling shrills while the music’s gradual slow crush, armed with a vitriolic array of swirling keyboards, dirge-like rhythmic poundings, and majestically ornate riffs overtake hapless souls in its path. Ripe with raw emotion and dripping with despair, this release oozes an ominous strain of doom and dread that fans of the slow, deep, and hard will easily tune into. www.season-of-mist.comMike SOS

4 StarsEsoteric is Greg Chandler (Vocals/Guitar), Gordon Bicknell (Guitar), Mark Bodossian (Bass), Olivier Goyet (Keyboards), & Joe Fletcher (Drums).

Track Listing:

  1. “Circle” (Disc 1)
  2. “Beneath This Face” (Disc 1)
  3. “Quickening” (Disc 1)
  4. “Caucus of Mind” (Disc 1)
  5. “Silence” (Disc 2)
  6. “Order Of Destiny” (Disc 2)
  7. “Ignotum Per Ignotius” (Disc 2)