This is the debut album from UK black metallers Praesider.
Enter the Praesidium contains 48 minutes of old-school symphonic black metal. Praesider’s music evokes such a strong sense of nostalgia in me for the 90s that it’s almost overwhelming. Make no mistake though, Praesider are a skilled bunch and know their subject matter inside out.
As a rough starting point, think of early Cradle of Filth for the base style – anyone familiar with that veteran band can hear their influence here. However, then throw in elements of acts like Arcturus, Dimmu Borgir, and Emperor, and you have an album that hits the spot.
It starts in suitably grand fashion, immediately revealing the band’s skilled use of choirs and clean singing. This is undoubtedly a strength throughout Enter the Praesidium. These choirs, twinned with the majestic use of keyboards, and the overall feeling given by 90s Cradle of Filth-influenced black metal, lends the songs a Gothic flavour that’s quite delicious. I’ll be unequivocal here – the keyboards and choirs are simply excellent throughout this record.
Following on from this, the songwriting in general is another strength of the music. Praesider have an obvious talent for this sort of material. It drips with Gothic splendour and dark menacing atmosphere. Aggression is used as another tool in the band’s arsenal, augmenting the keyboards and choirs, rather than the other way around, as is typically the case. Whether it is sharpening blades for a killing stroke, setting the stage for an eruption of grandeur, underpinning dramatic spectral keyboards, or going for the throat as the choirs soar, there’s a foundation of hostility that works with the rest of the music, rather than dominates.
Each track sounds as if it has had a lot of care and attention paid to it. The individual component parts are all well-delivered and executed, but it’s the overall song that is the master here. Praesider’s grip on songcraft is an iron one inside a velvet glove. The attention to detail that has obviously been lavished upon the instrumentation and vocals doesn’t obscure the band’s holistic approach to songwriting. This approach has successfully allowed Praesider to mix mood-focused worldbuilding, Gothic magnificence, and blackened might into an album that probably shouldn’t work as well as it does, given its ancient stylistic inspirations. What can I say – Praesider are damn good at this stuff.
Enter the Praesidium is an absolute treat for symphonic black metal fans. Despite recalling some notable names from the 90s, Praesider have enough character and personality of their own to pull it off.
Highly recommended for fans of the abovementioned bands, or simply anyone that wants to hear the old-school symphonic style delivered with skill.
Wonderbox Metal 