Review of Dodsferd - Cursing Your Will To Live

I remember reviewing Dodsferd’s last album and totally gushing over the raw black’n’roll sound that main man Wrath executed with such conviction and passion. His output for 2007 so far includes the Fucking Your Creation full-length and a split with fellow grimsters Ganzmord, which are now joined by yet another longplayer, Cursing Your Will to Live. Nothing much has changed over these past few months, it seems; Wrath seems pretty damn set in his ways, and apparently has the ability to churn out reliably well-done black metal in the blink of an eye. One-man black metal bands are one of the most prolific groups on the planet, I swear; Xasthur and Leviathan alone have more than fifty releases between them, and show no signs of slowing down. It just may serve as a testament to the dedication and focus of those who chose to create using such a medium; after all, raw black metal is not for the faint of heart or the social butterfly.

Dodsferd stand out a bit, geographically-speaking. Wrath hails from Greece, home of fellow bible-haters Rotting Christ and femme-black metallers Astarte, and is possibly one of the most annoyingly “kvlt” individuals I’ve ever encountered. I had the dubious pleasure of interviewing him for some magazine or another last year, and while he may not have been pleasant (or even entirely coherent) this dude is dead serious about his work. The disgust and hatred for humanity that he bases his lyrics upon is a legitimate part of his personality, and in an odd kind of way, I respect him for it. At least he believes in the message his music is sending, unlike so many others out there who will remain unmentioned. And what message might that be? FUCK EVERYONE.

Cursing Your Will to Live is venomous, melodically-inclined yet raw as hellfire black metal that will bring to mind equal doses of Satanic Warmaster and vintage Burzum (those pained howls are straight outta Aske) with razor-sharp riffing and a stick-in-your-head kind of catchiness. By now, well-developed, decently-produced, memorable songs about hating everything(especially religion) have become Wrath’s calling card, and this release sees him delivering plenty of them with ease. He’s also partial to movie samples, particularly of the “ironic snippet of Southern preacherman’s sermon” variety, which break things up nicely and stave off the inevitable monotony to which this style of black metal so easily falls victim. This album isn’t much different from the last one, but this isn’t exactly the sort of music in which artistic growth and experimentation are encouraged. Cursing Your Will to Live definitely has less of the “black’n’roll” thing going on, offering more slow-to-mid-paced death grooves buried underneath the fuzz, but there’s nothing truly original going on here. If you have more than a passing interest in the dirtier, more low-fi side of black metal, you’ve heard this a million times before, but it’s still done better than most of it. Definitely worth a listen if you’re into this kind of thing or dig Wrath’s other stuff.

Release Details

Dodsferd

Cursing Your Will To Live

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