Lucifer's Chalice - The Pact (2017)

On the surface, The Pact comes across pretty cool, with a simplistic and iconic sort of cover that aesthetically transports me back to the years of the NWOBHM movement, groups like Witchfynde or Angel Witch or Pagan Altar. Noting that this is a four-track album with occult themes would seem to deepen my interest, and once you're listening through you'll note they even pick up some classic samples from 60s and 70s horror flicks like Twins of Evil or City of the Dead. Unfortunately, I felt a little let down by the musical content of this debut, not because it's awful by any means, but because it seems so plain compared to what I might have expected from the title and lyrics, or the fact that it relies on tunes that are between 7-11 minute but doesn't tell a good enough story by way of the musical choices and structures.

The Pact is essentially blue-collar Iron Maiden worship, and while there is nothing at all with following in the footsteps of one of the (justifiably) most popular heavy metal bands of all time, they just don't do anything to further that or expand upon it. Now Eddie's crew have certainly explored a lot of dark and gloomy themes in its time, usually on the earlier albums, but the idea that one could transform that into something more sinister, occult, atmospheric is an appealing one. But when you listen to such basic, repetitive and unappealing riff progressions as you hear around the 3 and a half minute mark of the title track on this album, it's just immediately too bland to leave an impression. The basics are here, with a solid melodic production to the rhythm guitars, and some decent grooves in the bass playing which are reminiscent of Steve Harris, and a couple of the tracks like "Full Moon Nights" border on taking this where it needs to be, but I was constantly wishing the whole mood were darker, that there were some more dissonant and surprising choices in the notes, maybe breaking the mid-paced melodic anthems up to take some more chances.

Vocalist Charlie Wesley doesn't have a bad voice, he's clearly no Bruce Dickinson or earlier Mercyful Fate-era King Diamond, which he also slightly resembles...but who the hell really is? The issue is that a lot of his delivery is monotonous...where some lower or mid-range sneering lines would give this more of the evil vibe I'd have hoped for, he doesn't seem quite confident to spread out the delivery to the point where you get a more dynamic and cinematic personality that would itself help flavor the guitars a lot more. With titles like "Priestess of Death" or "Hung at the Crossroads", you'd expect something a lot more sinister beyond the samples, and The Pact comes up short. They lack the timeless earworm melodicism of the Angel Witch s/t, the doomy overtures of Pagan Altar, and even the more fun naughty hard rock and heavy metal of Witchfinder General and Demon, sticking with the safer bet of the world's most beloved metal band, but not in the same compelling way that they did throughout their classics in the 80s. Going by the fact that several of the members also play in darker bands of the doom or death variety, I would think they'd possess a little darker vibe.

I found much of this would just blend together and lack distinction. I'm not going to shit on this as entirely incompetent or inauthentic, it's not offensive to my ears. They clearly wanna give some love to their influence, and they're not exactly a 1:1 copy, the vocals are a little different as are the moods on a few of the riffs, but even among the ranks of whatever-generation modern throwback heavy metal this doesn't have much going for it. Think darker, more ambitious, if you're going to create such sprawling tracks as the opener here, take us on a journey. Go out on a limb. Make it look like it sounds, and yes I'm aware that history has given us hundreds of records that look a lot more evil than the musical content, but it's the 21st century and we know better. Old Sabbath, old Maiden, or old Hammer Horror films just hit the spot much more than this album can; huge shoes to fill, granted, but this doesn't even get its laces off.

Verdict: Indifference [5.5/10]

https://luciferschalice.bandcamp.com/album/the-pact