Praise of the Lord God Almighty

For many metalheads, symphonic black metal was a flavor of the week trend. Cradle of Filth and Dimmu Borgir’s popularization of the style in the late 90’s led to many imitators, yet none have ever gotten anywhere near their level of commercial dominance. 2008 saw a very successful addition from Abigail Williams in the form of In the Shadow of a Thousand Suns, but since then most bands who sought to capture the creative foundry offered by the classic black metal style have since left the keyboards behind. Yet in the Christian world of (un)black metal , symphonic works of grandeur still run rampant through the ranks, and nowhere is this achieved more tastefully than on Renascent’s 2016 heavyweight Praise of the Lord God Almighty.

Heavily rooted in a melodic death metal past, the Renascent’s second opus has much more in common with the latter Old Man’s Child catalogue than anything coming out of Gothenburg. Utilizing a massive sound of crushing heaviness contrasted by layers of symphonic extravagance, the band succeeds in creating a contemporary version of the big budget works of the early 2000’s symphonic metal without going overboard with theatrics or production.

At times the guitars border what you’d hear from a deathcore band – downtuned, atonal, technical, and full of power chords and fourth intervals. We’re also treated to some solid lead guitar playing that’s fun and enjoyable and never narcissistic or repetitive. The bass fills out the sound by sticking by the root notes of most of the riffs, and has plently of punch to supplement the methodical drumming. The synths are extrodinarily tasteful – elegantly composed, full of majesty and wonder but never cheesy or distracting. This is a rare find on albums where the guitars concede most of the melodies to the keyboards, but the arrangements are impressively constructed. The interplay of the keyboards and guitars is outstanding and proves to be very positively influenced by the real-life marriage between the band’s guitarist and keyboardist. Gutteral vocals are not commonly the main vocal style in symphonic black metal, but are here very well effective as proven by albums like Enthrone Darkness Triumphant and In Defiance of Existence.

But the most impressive part of this album is the mix! I can’t think of a single instance in which an independent band has produced such a high quality mix like this one. It’s so big and heavy that you’d think it was done in a massive studio for a hefty payload, but it appears the majority of the production, mixing, and mastering was done by the band members. The dynamics are impressive and all of the instruments are clear and audible at all times.

Symphonic black metal lives on in glory in the Christian metal community with works such as Antestor’s The Forsaken and Grave Declaration’s When Dying Souls Sing Praise. But no band captures the scope of the genre’s greatest attributes like Renascent on Praise of the Lord God Almighty. Fans of heavy guitars and heavy orchestration rejoice – Praise of the Lord God Almighty is the album you never knew you’ve been longing for. Praise the Lord indeed!