GEIST OF OUACHITA – Imprisoned in the Graven Wood (cassete)

One of the best new developments in American black metal, Geist of Ouachita is the work of one Roanake, who numbers nearly a dozen other projects the past three years, some of them even cross-continental. With Geist of Ouachita, the focus is on unremittingly grim yet alluringly melodic BLACK METAL: black metal from the ancient dungeons of the ’90s, and also black metal from the raw renaissance of the past decade – the latter, largely under the auspices of Signal Rex, who’ve made household names of Portugal’s most intimidating cults.

After a split with Eternal Tomb earlier this year courtesy of Signal Rex, Geist of Ouachita arrive with their full-length debut, Imprisoned in the Graven Wood. With ghastly and ghostly aplomb, Roanoke reaps a whirlwind of dungeonic hideousness tempered with an askew melodicism that makes the six-song/33-minute record strangely hummable. Such did France’s eternal Black Legions do so back in the mid ’90s, but Geist of Ouachita expand the narrative quality latent to such melodies and wind through them deceptively epic corridors. Similarly, Portugal’s own Black Circle provide an aesthetic foundation, but Roanoke continually evinces his own personality here in the remarkably varied songwriting, often underpinned by a subtle (and sensual) fog of synths, altogether making for an engaging listen even when faced with such a stratifying soundfield. Resistance is futile once one becomes Imprisoned in the Graven Wood!