{"id":50841,"date":"2025-08-07T17:43:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T17:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/50841\/"},"modified":"2025-08-07T17:43:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T17:43:08","slug":"theurgion-all-under-heaven-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/50841\/","title":{"rendered":"Theurgion – All Under Heaven Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"I\u2019ll give it to the folks at Profound Lore\u2019s PR department. As I processed the All Under Heaven debut by unheralded doom-death act Theurgion and prepared to hurl it into the reeking promo sump, I felt the irresistible urge to take it for myself due to this subtle teaser tidbit: \u201ccomprised of seven sculptured sonic monuments that hail those that came before Solitude Aeturnus, OLD Katatonia, OLD Anathema\/Paradise Lost, first October Tide LP\u2026.\u201d Those are mighty big FFO nods, and I fell victim to the hype like a lowly n00b, tucking the promo in my ape pouch and skulking into the sultry night. The PR spinners didn\u2019t lie either. What Theurgion do is totally what I want doom-death to be. I initially feared a frightful blow to the Score Safety Counter might be as inevitable as a hangover after 5 glasses of Doc Grier\u2018s cactus pruno punch. The atmosphere is rife with weepy melancholy. The heavy doom riffs are there and effectively crushing. What could go wrong with so much rightness happening? Did I find the next Fvneral Fvkk?<\/p>\n

Though I\u2019m not much for instrumental openers, I can\u2019t knock \u201cMourning Tide\u201d at all. It\u2019s a tremendously moody, engaging table-setter promising an album\u2019s worth of despondent despair, and it\u2019s well executed from soup to sadboi nuts. When the first proper track, the 10-plus minute \u201cLavender & Silver,\u201d kicked into existence with mournful chanting, weepy trilling, crunching doom riffs, and booming death vocals, Steel was in his happy place. As the pained and plaintive clean vocals arrive, they seem solid and appropriate; a forlorn mid-range croon with muscle behind it, sort of halfway between Danzig and The Cult\u2019s Ian Astbury. Things keep building upward toward greatness, with me held in thrall. For the first 7 minutes, all is right in the world, but as things start to wind to a conclusion, the clean vocals of vocalist\/drummer L.C. start to go off the rails as he reaches for ever higher registers with his macho man bellowing. He starts to sound like an old, tired Danzig, and increasingly struggles to stay in tune. It ultimately doesn\u2019t ruin what is a very effective doom-death epic, but the chinks in the armor become very visible by the end. These vocal issues resurface immediately in follow-up \u201cThrice-Named\u201d as L.C. tries to sound anguished and tormented. As the album develops, those shout\/sing\/bellows become more problematic. Eventually, you feel relief when he lapses into death roars. This is a real shame, too, as the song has a lot going for it. It reminds me of the early days of Deathwhite, and I love the Goth-infused atmosphere Theurgion craft here.<\/p>\n

There are many high-quality moments to be found on All Under Heaven, and the band can certainly write compelling doom-death epics that grab the listener by the ghost nuts and squeeze. But the vocals become a kind of wrecking ball blasting through the carefully curated moods to bring disorder and irritation to the listener. On \u201cThe Storm,\u201d L.C. tempers his delivery enough to beguile and enchant on a track filled with vibrant guitar work and a strong Enshine-meets-Primordial vibe. It\u2019s a beautifully glum and downcast little number, and it works because the vocals largely compliment the music instead of sucker punching it with a sack full of antique doorknobs. Unfortunately, on the 12-minute title track, L.C. overdoes his shout-singing to the point where you\u2019d gladly fork over funds to send him to Count Orlok\u2019s quiet time retreat deep in the Carpathian Mountains. One could also quibble about the 3 instrumental interludes, including the intro and outro. They aren\u2019t bad, but aside from the opener, they feel unnecessary.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The real shame of it all is that L.C. is actually a capable vocalist. His death roars are fully on point, and he can manage effective cleans when he stays in a middle range and refrains from forcing his upper range to the point where control flies out the window. He\u2019s a case study on less is MOAR, and proves that MOAR can be way too much. Guitarists A.P. and R.F. do a rock-solid job across the album, creating richly melancholic soundscapes without forgetting to use the doom riff cudgel to keep the listener honest. There are nods to all the bands name-dropped in the PR material, especially Paradise Lost and Katatonia, and they know how to deliver grimly beautiful doom-death. If we are going solely on instrumentation, this thing is close to a 4.0. With vocals added, things get slicey dicey and make scoring Under All Heaven a real trial by fire.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a lot to love on Theurgion\u2019s debut opus. The atmosphere is dark and mournful, and the guitar work is inspired. Hell, even the vocals deliver the doomy goods about half the time. I struggled a lot with how to rate this thing, but ultimately, your enjoyment will come down to how well you vibe with L.C.\u2019s \u201cunique\u201d style. For me, his \u201celderly Danzig on the toilet\u201d style killed too many otherwise glorious moments. Mileage may vary, and I sincerely hope it does, because Theurgion have the potential to become something great.<\/p>\n

\ufeff<\/p>\n

Rating: 2.5\/5.0
DR: 10 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Profound Lore<\/a>
Websites: Too mysterious for the webz?
Releases Worldwide: August 8th, 2025<\/p>\n

\n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I\u2019ll give it to the folks at Profound Lore\u2019s PR department. As I processed the All Under Heaven…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":50842,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[13410,2325,28178,6447,22284,9986,28179,6448,96,28180,128,28181,28182,263,129,28183,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-50841","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-2-5","tag-2325","tag-all-under-heaven","tag-american-metal","tag-aug25","tag-death-metal","tag-deathwhite","tag-doom-metal","tag-entertainment","tag-katatonia","tag-music","tag-paradise-lost","tag-profound-lore-records","tag-review","tag-reviews","tag-theurgion","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50841","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50841"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50841\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}