High Inquisitor Woe – Painted Vision Of An Era Forlorn

High Inquisitor Woe
Painted Vision Of An Era Forlorn
Label: Gio Smet Records
Out: October 28^th, 2024
Playing time: 58:41

High Inquisitor Woe hail from Lommel in the Belgian province of Limburg. And they have dedicated themselves to Epic Doom Metal. In the Encyclopaedia Metallum, their current status is set to ‘On hold’. That no longer seems to be correct. After all, the band, which was founded in 2014, is releasing its second studio album ‘Painted Vision Of An Era Forlorn’ in October. The trio recorded, produced, mixed and mastered the album themselves. The album itself will be released via the Belgian label Gio Smet Records.

‘Praeludium’ is just another name for an intro. After some sound gadgets, a depressing melody can be heard. Quite appropriate for Doom Metal. But is this introduction absolutely necessary? I don’t know. One and a half minutes later, ‘Eos-Aurora’ starts. And that with a huge flood of low-pitched guitars. Add to that the rousing and at the same time gloomy vocals. An Epic Doom monster with a playing time of almost fifteen minutes and huge twin guitar solos that are permanently underpinned by the Doom riffs. The guitar melody sounds alternately from both sound channels. However, who contributes the ethereal, dark female vocals unfortunately remains in the dark. However, this sprawling length is not repeated later on. ‘He Who Wards Off Wolf’ is more than ten minutes shorter. This shortest regular song is also less decelerated. But no less gloomy. ‘The Golden Bough’ is then calmer again. With hard-hitting riffs. And some of the guitars sound very dissonant. ‘Interludium’ is an instrumental interlude. As with the intro, sound collages dominate here. ‘Maron – The Night Demon’ makes up for this with hard, deep riffs and a haunting guitar melody. Once again, a female speaking and singing voice can be heard. Towards the end, the drums pick up the pace once again. The title track ‘Painted Vision Of An Era Forlorn’ is sombre and calm. Although the volume is kept high thanks to the roasting guitars. The vocals almost sound like a lament, which sometimes has a hard time asserting itself against the brute force of the guitars. At the beginning of ‘Inside The Dwelling Of The Moon God’ there are clean guitars and wind noises from the synthesiser. And the hard guitar riffs are very calm, bordering on funeral doom. ‘Postludium’ is the album’s outro.

In my assessment of ‘Painted Vision Of An Era Forlorn’, I’ll leave out the intro, interlude and outro. These don’t really seem to fit in with the ‘normal’ songs. These spread an extremely gloomy atmosphere. And they are characterised by harsh guitar sounds and pounding drums. So apart from the three small gaps, High Inquisitor Woe have released a convincing Doom Metal album.

High Inquisitor Woe – Painted Vision of an Era Forlorn: https://youtu.be/j47sANAKcSE?si=bKmot2Fnu5iQDpON

Lineup:

Glenn Stappaerts – Lead Vocals, Guitars
Mathijs Ignoul – Backing Vocals, Guitars, Bass
Victor Schepers – Drums

Track list:

• Praeludium
• Eos – Aurora
• He Who Wards Off Wolf
• The Golden Bough
• Interludium
• Maron – The Night Demon
• Painted Vision Of An Era Forlorn
• Inside The Dwelling Of The Moon God
• Postludium