- Anyone listening in to the sound of my voice last year heard me sing the endless praise of Bitter Loss Records and it looks like 2023 will follow along that same trajectory with VAHRZAW opening the account for the year with an exceptional outing. Regarding the band themselves, they’re now four name changes and five albums deep into their innings. With so many well earned runs on the board, the chance for something a little different is there for the taking, but instead of fully employing a change of pace, the long standing Australian trio take a more subtle route. In The Shallows of A Starlit Lake is draped in the aesthetic and presentation of a maximum speed, minimal fuss style of black metal with everything charged with misanthropy and blasted with as much visceral energy as one can muster. Present that way it may, but much like the album title itself, that’s but a reflection of what’s actually going on under the surface.

VAHRZAW have mastered that interesting trick of putting forward songs without many frills or garnishes because of how its swallowed into the expanse of blast beats, tremolo riffs, and guttural vocals. Whilst giving the impression that these elements are being pulled at breakneck speed towards the eventual cavalcade of chaos by the unruly left horse, uncontrolled and unable to be reined in, the right horse is guiding this mayhem through the subtle melodies that encase the turbulence. How tightly produced and played these tracks are is the work of the charioteer.

In the belly of Amber Glow of the Gaslight, the tumult subsides and puts forward calming, albeit eerie melodies to birth some quiet, atmospheric pondering. In a deft touch, the tune here is an ever so slightly tweaked melody reprised from what the black metal buzzsaw guitars were doing in the first half. What’s more, the guitar line that barrages its way to the end of this song and towards the album title track, emerges from this mellow middle.

There’s a through line on the eponymous track with the bushland chorus prior to a storm peering in here and that storm we hear eventuate as it comes to a close. The back end features slower, more direct rhythms than the endless torrent and this groove does well in breaking up the flow ever so slightly. The three shorter songs on the record give slack to the haggard and insolent left horse, giving it greater freedom to careen into the simple joy of hard, loud, and fast black metal. To offset this, the second longest track on the album is its closer and To Breathe In Leviathan tweaks the formula yet again. There has been a smattering of keyboards throughout the release but they are best deployed here, giving a grand swelling sense of atmosphere to close out the record. There’s also a soundclip nestled away of a woman and a baby crying which peppers in that little bit extra. I mean that or someone living next to me has a consistently bad time as it comes to a close.

For VAHRZAW to maintain a sense of an ill natured, uncontrolled beast over long songs and consistently across a record shouldn’t be a surprise for a band who’ve been at it for as long as they have. What surprised me though is that beneath that aesthetic and sonic presentation of belligerent blistering by the left horse, the right horse and the charioteer are the ones ultimately in control. The crystallisation of melodies gently swirling away beneath the reflective surface shows that it goes deeper. If you were only in the shallows, you’d still enjoy it. If you head towards the centre, into the depths, there’s even more for you to enjoy.

- Matt Lynch.