Hierophant



2007 - The Tome

Reviews:

The Metal Crypt
(january 2008)
(4,25/5)

This CD compiles the complete discography of the Funeral Doom band Hierophant (the band that was a pre-cursor to the fantastic band Catatcombs). As the band only released three admittedly lengthy EPs in their lifespan, a couple of the tracks on offer are repeated in the first few tracks, (albeit with a greater production on the re-recorded efforts). Don't let it put you off though, as this is a great addition to any funeral doom fans collection.

Rumbling and crawling with the same Lovecraftian expansiveness that encapsulated Catacombs' two releases, "The Tome" is an achingly slow, crushing tide of cement grey matter pushing down on you for over an hour of sheer despondency. Whilst the pounding rhythm guitar effervesces and crackles out its oh-so-slow rhythms, another guitar lays down a delicate melody to truly twist the knife with a smile. The sound is rounded out by the bass, which hums and resonates throughout, as well as the sporadic drum hits which pierce the atmosphere with gunshot like cracks, and the fantastic gurgled growls that seep throughout the mix like bubbles in a tar pit. All these things combine effortlessly for a twisted, sludgy brew of epic proportions.

This is a thoroughly enjoyable release throughout (even with the repeated tracks so early on), and a perfect album for fans wanting to hear more high quality funeral doom in the vein of Thergothon and Skepticism.


Reviewed by: Lars Christiansen

Chronicles Of Chaos
(january 2008)
(7/10)

This is the re-release of a compilation, previously available only on CD-R and limited to a ridiculous 135 copies! The three EPs are _Hierophant_, _The Weight of Winter_ and _Autumn Dusk_. Hierophant is the project of one Xathagorra Mlandroth, and was later renamed as Catacombs. (Solitude Productions have also re-released Catacombs' _Enter the Catacombs_.)
_Hierophant_ consists of two songs, both of which appear in re-mastered form on _The Weight of Winter_. Normally, this would be an unnecessary duplication, but considering the rawness of the originals, which featured background tape hiss(!), perhaps re-mastering is not only justified but an absolute necessity.

Compared to Mlandroth's later re-incarnation, this is considerably slower, which may seem unbelievable to those who have heard Catacombs' agonizingly slow pacing; it is also much simpler, focusing more on evoking a minimalist droning atmosphere. Some tinkling keys, a touch of ultra guttural vocals, some droning rhythms, and that's it.

The booklet proclaims that "Doom is something to be experienced, not just listened to..." The latter claim is doubtful, but the former is true, as despite all the deficiencies, he does manage to create a masterful atmosphere of oppressive despair.

Hierophant is not as intriguing as Catacombs, but is essential in the growth of this renowned project and will be relevant to anyone interested in the early days of American funeral doom.

Reviewed by: Quentin Kalis

Old Reviews (2001-2002)

HIEROPHANT - The Weight of Winter/Autumn Dusk
Black Beyonds Music 2001/2002 (respectively)

I finally got ahold of these from J./Hierophant and I was surprised and how unbelievably crushingly heavy these two releases are. Both comprise 3 tracks of fucking nihilist brutally heavy funeral doomdeath and Ceremonium's "Into the Autumn Shade" immediatlely comes to mind while listening to "Autumn Dusk" for its slowness and vocal delivery. Minimalistic droning brutal doom at its finest for such releases. Think Thergothon meets Skepticism meets Evoken meets Ceremonium to give you an idea as to how this sounds. Utterly oppressive, crushing, disturbingly sick funeral doomdeath at its finest!
If you get a chance to acquire these releases either from Hierophant or from a friend, please by all means DO SO! Not many copies left as of 11/14/02 from Black Beyonds Music. I am an avid fan and it was ABOUT FUCKING TIME I acquired these two brutal gems from Heirophant!

Review by: Michael W. Soucy
http://www.forlorn-souls.net

Doom-metal.com (Hierophant EP)

This EP contains two of the three tracks one can find back in Hierophant's second EP ' The weight of winter', but the tracks here are not yet remastered by Dario Derna (also known as the keyboard player of Evoken). Hierophant is an one-man doom-metal project from New Jersey. The members from ultradoom band Evoken don't hesitate to praise Hierophant on each occasion they get the chance to, and those who had the luck to listen to one of the two EP's from this band, know why.
The unrelentingly slow, hallucinatingly heavy DOOM Hierophant lets loose on the unsuspecting listener, immediately grips him at his throat, breaking his sorry bones. The weapons that are used in this nightmarish experience, are crushingly heavy distortion guitars, pounding drums and a death grunt that sounds like the dead's answer to this unfortunate being that dared to disturb their peaceful sleep, making them REALLY angry. The production is very underground and obscure (you can even hear some background hiss), but those who are used to the raw sound of underground releases, shall hardly spill a tear about this.

The minimalistic drone sounds of Hierophant, so monotonous and devoid of any temperament or human emotions, are extremely addictive and those who have felt the call of the DOOM of bands like diSEMBOWELMENT, Thergothon, Dusk and other monuments of brutal, mysterious and slowed down metal, should already start salivating like Pavlov's dogs when reading this review.

Some time ago, J. Del Russi (the founder/sole member of this band) talked about disbanding this soulcrushing project. I'm very glad that he changed his mind in the meanwhile, because the world needs new, promising ultradoom.

Reviewed by Kostas Panagiotou of Doom-metal.com

Eternal Frost (Hierophant EP)

HIEROPHANT Hierophant Black Beyonds Music (2000) Oh, fuck yeah!! The riffs are so tortorously slow you'd think it's diSEMBOWELMENT that's coming out of your speakers. But, no! It's New Jersey's Hierophant, a one-man band obviously influenced by the doom/death giants of the early '90s. While the doom metal scene has basically gone the way of shit, there are still a few bands looking to keep the old-school doom/death metal vibe alive. It makes me damn proud to hear a band play this slow and this depressing, and with a human drummer! Main man John even uses a piano commendably - as an accompanying instrument, not as lead, the way too many of today's goth-influenced "doom" bands use synth, piano and other non-traditional instruments. John's vocals thankfully never stray from the guttural plane and the music never speeds up, two things I find deserve high praise. This is sloth-paced, decapitating doom metal that will fill nicely the void left behind by bands such as Thergothon, Winter and the aforementioned diSEMBOWELMENT.

Erebus Magazine (Hierophant EP)

A 'hierophant', in the most literal definition, was an initiate or priest of the Eleusinian mysteries, those ancient rites of the Greeks where those lucky enough (or, depending on how you see it, those who unfortunate enough) to be ranked as members of a select class were introduced to the secrecy-cloaked ceremonies of Persephone, Hades, and Demeter, and were led through something of a cryptic pre-Masonic series of rituals where the uttermost 'truths' of nature were revealed to them. In these times, one of the most prestigious honors a visitor to the Greek isles (and Athens in particular) could be granted was an indoctrination into these mysteries, which were at the heart of the nation's culture and aristocratic fraternity. If one studies the Eleusinian mysteries closely, it becomes obvious that the only thing we can now gather from their import or ceremonial history is that they were fertility rites of the most 'blasphemous' sort, and that their procession was hidden for a very good reason: to protect them from the disgust, outrage, or misunderstanding of the 'ignorant' multitude. In less literal terms, a 'hierophant' is a devotee or initiate of the mystical or occult arts, and I wouldn't hesitate here in discussing this release to reference the 'original' motif of 'the occult', that is, its true meaning: the hidden, obscured parts of knowledge and nature.

There has always been something of a 'mystical' tradition in the doom-death genre, ever since Disembowelment's ground-breaking 'Transcendence into the Peripheral' and Thergothon's 'Stream from the Heavens', that marries the most disparate elements of metal melodicism into a grand tapestry of dark evocation, and Hierophant is no different. What I mean by this is: almost all of the doom-death bands that have come to my notice since Disembowelment have been influenced by that band's particular style of blending very slow rumbling muted chords with ethereal melodies - that is, an amalgam of light and dark, combining the crushing rhythms of downtuned, detuned distorted guitars with an angelic slow-picked clean guitar riding high above, seemingly calling the listener to rise above the suffocating miasma of the downtrodden Earth into the stratosphere of 'mystical', hypnotic contemplation. All the best doom-death bands have had this quality and have used this effect: they oppress the senses with claustrophobic walls of black sound, only to offer an escape through higher ringing progressions beneath, above, or outside the torturously slow main rhythms. The lower melodies exist as a turbid foundation for the incense-dreaming of the higher, and the higher tones are something of a diaphanous veil behind which lurk the despairing movements of the lower. Hierophant, it will easily be seen (or heard) have surely learned this technique by a close-listening to Disembowelment, and the two songs included here, 'Forever Dying' and 'Where No Light Hath Shone...(But For That Of The Moon)', take this style of pulverising doom-death to its logical extremes. This is surely the slowest and most agonizing doom I have heard in a long time: the black stench of death and decay lingers thickly throughout the crawling rhythm guitars while outside of these play hypnotizingly repetitive abstract melodies adding a Lunar, Purgatorial atmosphere to the proceedings. The drumming is a Tell-Tale Heart slowly, slowly winding its way down to nothingness. The deep vocals are inhuman roars of anguish or pain, and they glide through these soundscapes like winds of desolation, a pulsing earthquake far underground, or like the remorseless chantings of a prophet of armageddon. Perhaps the best part of all this, the combination of all its effects, is that this music becomes trance-inducing, much like early Evoken or the other bands I have mentioned above, and invites the mind to escape the boundaries or strictures of the prosaic in order to meditate on the direst subjects of the mysterious - this is the best effect that this style of music can offer. When it is at its best, doom-death proceeds like a call from beyond the grave, a mesmerizing symphony that displaces the personality and reduces the listener to a dreaming apostle of ruin. I can only hope that this band continues to experiment in the future, and sets their further descents into the abyss firmly on tape in order for the rest of us to follow. There need to be more bands like this - where is the doom revolution?

U. Amtey
21 October 2000

Demonic Horde (Hierophant EP)

Hierophant HIEROPHANT (usa)
"Hierophant" - DemoCD 99-00 (self-release - Black Beyond Music)

Hierophant presents here a two songs promo of an extreme Doom Death Metal experiment. These crushing and depressive creations reach here the most suffocating areas of boundless emotions and beings. Following the old-school Doom-Death Metal style of the earlier 90's, as Funeral or Disembolwement, this one-man band offers here one of the slowest Doom-Metal of the actual scene. Using his voice as an alive instrument, a tortured and confident stream guiding us through these saturated guitars scopes and other agonizing and repetitive melodies. The Hierophant (or pope, High Priest), card #5 in the Major Arcana - Tarot of Toth, is represented by a religious figure blessing two initiated. The Hierophant interpreters occult knowledge and mysteries; He's the symbol of Initiations "I open myself to the wisdom of the Universe" - More about this figure in the DemonicHorde Occult section. Hierophant is the second release of Black Beyond Music productions, also main member of Hierophant. A deep and mystical experiment, recommended!

Grendel Webzine (Hierophant EP)

HIEROPHANT--
Hierophant (Black Beyonds Music)

It's under ten minutes and only has two songs, but this disc by Hierophant is well worth seeking out if you're into the bleaker, more crushing side of doom metal. Skepticism might be an apt point of comparison, as Hierophant utilize the same style of very primitive, very methodical doom, although this band has enough of its own elements to differentiate itself from the Finns. For example, their usage of keyboard melodies, which work well when paired with the juggernaut walls of guitar that dominate Hierophant's songs...actually, the band's approach to keyboards reminds me of midpoint Burzum, with the keys hovering over the perpetual drone/battery of the guitars, using melody as a contrast to the almost ambient doom riffs. The vocals, too, are reminiscent of the better parts of Burzum, not in tone, but in approach...Hierophant thankfully use a very low, monotone death chant that provides the perfect complement to the funereal music. Very well done. The production on the disc is extremely raw, the guitars having a sort of ripping, near-grinding tone that only makes the songs that much more somber...almost like a wail of mourning. That's the good side of bad sound here...the downside is that the drums are not as powerful as I'd like, but turning the bass up on your stereo should suffice to correct any problems there. Metal of this type appeals to me a lot, as you've probably figured out, and Hierophant have impressed me with this two-track release. It will be very interesting to see where they take their style of primitive doom on a full-length... --Craig

Qvadrivivm #4 (Hierophant EP)

Hierophant - s/t Self-released, 2001.

An enormous, lumbering force rests its weight in the darkest, most desolate wastes of New Jersey. Its name is Hierophant and this self-titled release is its first appearance, as I understand it, into the rays of the cursed light. Taking great influence from such established creatures as Evoken and Disembowelment, Hierophant stomps and crushes all in its path with this two-song, ten-minute, ultra-slow-motion demonstration. The vocals sound like something not of this world, born of angst and misery, and recorded as though echoing from some inconceivably deep place from within the bowels of the earth. The voice of an age-old beast stuck buried in the earth and calling out in ghastly tones... The production itself could have been better, and ten minutes worth of material is, admittedly, somewhat hard to thoroughly judge an artist by, but it is more than enough to establish Hierophant as one of the better doom bands to emerge from the US shores. Worth inspection for the vocals alone, which are sure to haunt the listener in his sleep... and beyond! Morbid cries from deep inside the decrepit cemetery gates... a good example of how certain things only get better with time! Contact the band at : blackbeyondsmusic@hotmail.com.

Corridor Of Cells (Hierophant - 'The Weight Of Winter')

HIEROPHANT "THE WEIGHT OF WINTER" Black Beyonds Music 6.5 / 8

Fans of Disembowelement and Thergothon, rejoice! A new outfit from the U.S. has risen to reclaim the glory of early 1990s funeral doom in the most uncompromising and stripped down way possible. Hierophant is a one-man project, executing of a very straightforward approach. Ultra-slow drums plod forwards, while an ultra-thick, distorted guitar dishes out downtuned slow riffs of tortured doom. On top of top we get extremely apocalyptic growls and the melodic sounds of an acoustic guitar. Despite the rather raw production, the whole release (3 songs, nearly 25 minutes) manages to achieve it's end goal of providing the heaviest, most depressive and frightening dose of extreme doom/death metal possible. There is not a single second on this EP that could be classified as up-tempo or even mid-tempo. Everything is slow, slow as the spread of gangrene in a rotting body, slow as one can only imagine. Listening to Hierophant is like standing in front of a 10-ton bulldozer which slowly, very slowly inches towards you and pushes you inch by inch towards certain death by crushing against a wall behind your back. It is a good feeling to experience, I've not heard doom metal like this in a long time. The sole band member is supposedly considering disbanding this project due to lack of response (presumably because this stuff is just too extreme for most of the trendy metal crowd), but I urge him to continue and bring us more of this wonderful mixture of sludge, death, filth and unholiness in the future. There are some minor complaints (stripped-down production, occasional slip-ups), but overall, this is raw, simple, yet very effective. You can get a copy cheap from http://www.angelfire.com/nj3/BlackBeyondsMusic, so don't waste your time and do it now.

Doom-metal.com (Hierophant - 'The Weight Of Winter')

Hierophant 'The Weight of Winter'
Black Beyonds Music (2001) - Approx. 25 minutes [Mcd]

Prepare to abandon all hope and follow that one way downward spiral into depression. From the depths of depression and despair the sound of Hierophant echoes. In the vein of bands like Thergothon and Skepticism, this Mcd offers us funeral doom in its purest form. With grunts that sound like a horrible beast rather than a human being, music so heavy it could crush a grown up man and an average speed that would make the guys from Skepticism proud, it is hard to escape the cesspool of misery Hierophant opens. It is also not surprising that fellow conveyers of ultimate musical despair Evoken personally recommend this work. Needless to say I am highly impressed. This is music that makes you turn the lights off, lay on your bed and sink away in self-pity. The only true shame about this release is that Hierophant is cursed with a virus that infects almost all bands in this style: bad production. Also just like it happened with Dusk, diSEMBOWELMENT and Thergothon before, Hierophant was only short lived. Due to health reasons this Mcd became Hierophant's swan song (be it a very deformed, sick and twisted swan with obvious suicide tensions). You can get this Mcd for $12 by sending an e-mail to blackbeyondsmusic@hotmail.com. Reviewed by Asgorath

Doom-metal.com (Hierophant - 'Autumn Dusk')

Autumn Dusk (Demo) 2002 Black Beyonds Music

Hierophant's 'The weight of winter' was for me last year's reminder why underground doom has stolen my heart: raw, unpolished, heavy as fuck and lethally brutal, it managed to kick my ass on several occasions, banning from my room the annoying sounds of my neighbour listening to Flemish schlagers. Being the heaviest demo I heard that year, I didn't expect to find a tape with even heavier Hierophant material playing in my stereo some months later. It only confirmed the fact that this projects' evolution seems to run parallel with that of US doom gods Evoken, descending closer and closer to hell with each consecutive release.

Typical for Hierophant's sound are the massively downtuned, excruciating slow guitars, pounding drums and J. del Russi's ultradeep grunt which sounds as if the Living Dead are standing behind your door ready to get you. A monotonous, mesmerizing clean guitar is layered all over this sonic violence, unavoidably leading the listener's mind towards albums like 'Transcendence into the peripheral' and 'Epistemological despondency' which stood at the dawn of this kind of mystical ultradoom. However, to fully appreciate the grandeur of this unwordly music, one should try to shut out any references to other bands during the listening experience, avoiding generalizations and comparisons and letting Hierophant weave its mystically brutal sounds and mysterious essence, evoking dark and nocturnal emotions from the initiated listener.

In the meanwhile, J. del Russi heralded the end of this project, making us realize how precious and sacred the sounds are of those few bands that dared to cross the line of what is considered acceptable, unleashing that which according to the majorities should better stay imprisoned and well-hidden. Its dark essence can only be benevolent to the few, causing great harm and suffering to the others. May 'Autumn dusk' be for the next generations the final evidence that such hidden forces are always there, lingering in the dark, patiently waiting to be unleashed upon mankind just once, only once ..."for we shall not pass this way again"...

Reviewed by Kostas Panagiotou

Demonic Horde (Hierophant - 'Autumn Dusk')

HIEROPHANT (USA) "Autumn Dusk" Demo 2002 (Black Beyond Music)

Hierophant is a one-man band created by J. Del Russi, also acting in the BM act SECT, & owning the us Label Black Beyond Music. Hierophant is about Doom Metal, even extreme Doom, where the weight of the music reach the slower frequencies ever heard. They present here their second official Demo, gathering 3 long and implacable tracks, darken than Evoken, or Equimanthorn. Their blackest release so far, fitting the title "Autumn Dusk", a penible trip in the half-light of this dying autumn. This time Hierophant didn't add any atmospheric sweetness nor useless musical notes, the minimalist melodies appear rarely, just some notes here and there, slowly supporting the agonishing riffs and the heavy vocal tones. Hierophant successes to deliver abysmal compositions, where the vocals are so extremely draggin' and sickly dark as they almost carry you down to a boundeless gulf. I thought until that the most inhuman murmurs were these of the Icelandic band ?lfur, where the voice suddenly appears like a "Deus Ex Machina" through deep melodies. But in Hierophant, not only the vocals, but the whole music seems to drag us into deadly and malefic swamps - some quick-sands of inner emotions like sadness, despair and surrender. The slowness litteraly burden our mind, and force us to follow this un-naturel rhythm, this of our deepest paths, experimental and extreme, recommended. More on Black Beyonds Music
. Or on the official Hierophant Website.

Rebarbartive Recordings (Hierophant - 'Autumn Dusk')

HIEROPHANT "Autumn Dusk" demo-cd
(2002, Black Beyonds Music) 3 tracks, 30:47

Hierophant has been compared to bands like Disembowelment, Esoteric ("Awaiting My Death" from their "Epistemological Despondency" 2-cd is the fucking most accurate depiction of despondency put onto tape... perhaps until NOW?!), Skepticism or Thergothon ... Funeral Doom with ultraslow tempos, yes. But of course alot of differences between all bands concerning instrumentation, effects use, and concepts... This is PURE GLOOM. Just bleak, somber, black and COLD. Production is a bit more rough than on "The Weight Of Winter" but the atmosphere remains and prevails, the guitar tones are SICK and the overall effect is pure funereal oblivion, forgetting about this shitball called planet earth for at least 30 minutes. The creator of Hierophant has since announced this to be the final Hierophant release, as he is pursuing another dark music project. Hierophant Website.
(19 April 02)