Weft - The Splintered Oar

Weft is a blackened death metal project from Panopticon’s Charlie Anderson.  Together with Austin Lunn (also involved with Panopticon), Andrea Morgan and Jordan Day the full-length album “The Splintered Oar,” is ready to debut. 

And what an album it is!  The usage of violin in metal is commonplace but rarely have I heard it used so effectively and efficiently than on “The Splintered Oar.”  It isn’t just there to compliment the heavier aspects—the album simply couldn’t exist without it any more than it could the other instruments. 

Although this firmly into an extreme metal foundation, the violin adds a layer of reality and classical approach to the blackened death giving the album a unique feel because it exists in two different worlds even as it successfully combines them together.

The production makes it all shine; each detail is clear and concise—I can almost feel the sinews of the songs hold everything together and the formation and passing of each carefully placed note. 

The first song is the instrumental “Leaves.”  It isn’t a metal song but it’s surprisingly moving and even what I might call beautiful.  It also fits the flow of the album and is a good introduction to all of it, especially since the track that follows it carries on its theme and ideas.

That song is “False Kingdoms.”  It spends the first two and a half minutes or so as sort of an extension of “Leaves,” before the damn bursts and the blackened death comes ripping out.  It is immediately evident that it’s as riff based as much as it is violin infused—the guitars and violin play off each amazingly well.  Sweeping passages of melancholy give way to pummeling speed and violent outbursts….and vice versa.  

“The Hull,” is frantic with infectious urgency and has a massive folk vibe strong across its atmosphere.   I like the grandiose feel to this song, amplified by the cleaning chanting but the extreme vocals add a lot here too. The thick strumming of the bass hits on the mark too, adding a dense wall that helps offset some of the more melodic moments.   The drums are insane battering, cleverly played but always complimenting the song.  

“Red Dawn,” is the heaviest and most intense of the five songs.  The drums will rock your brain to the side, but the lead guitar will hammer in an intense collection of notes, pushed further by the rhythm.  This song is like a storm upon the ocean, attempting to push over the ship but allowing it to right itself just before it is to go under.  These quick snaps of dynamic changes are very exciting.

And then we get to the final song, “Dream of Oaks,” a 12-minute epic that takes everything the album has to offer and pushes it to the next level.  The clean vocals in the beginning are a nice surprise, and the first few minutes of the song have a singer/songwriter feel to it.  The fact the band can work something like this into a death/black album is a testament to how electric it truly is.  A wild guitar solo and crashing drums push the speed to lighting levels in the middle passage—it’s almost maddening!  The back half of the song is one-part black metal and another hectic atmospheric layering….so fucking cool!

All in all, Weft’s “The Splintered Oar,” is quite the surprise album that seemingly came out of nowhere, but it is a must listen for those looking for extreme metal that isn’t afraid to reach beyond its confines.

Rating: Excellent