Hooded Menace – Effigies of Evil

Releasedate: 25-09-2012; Label: Relapse Records
By: Sabine van Gameren

Hooded Menace is a formation from Finland. They make Death/Doom since 2007 and created quite a discography through the years of their existence. This year the band releases their third full length album called “Effigies of Evil”.

While having their not so great Tuska performance still in mind, it was a bit of gamble with this release. Would the guys impress more this time or would this release just confirm what we saw before. Everyone can have a bad day, so we gave it a shot. The guys show that they still feel the love for the sound from the past, having those influences so clearly upfront in their music. The grooving bass warms up the sound a bit, giving it its body. This release has also one thing that stands out well and that would be the drummer. Somehow he surprises you time after time with some interesting elements. The guys keep the tempo up quite well that embraced by the Death part of their sound it makes that the flow is still going strong for them.
“Effigies of Evil” brought more up that that lousy performance we saw of them (yes, it was really disappointing) so it was obviously a bad day. Luckily the album sets it right a bit and if the guys would play at Tuska again it causes that I would really like to see if their music works out better this time.

Line up:
Lasse – guitar, bass, vocals
Pekka – drums
Teemu – guitar

Tracklist: 1. Vortex Macabre 2. Effigies of Evil 3. In the Dead We Dwell 4. Curses Scribed in Gore 5. Crumbling Insanity 6. Summoned into Euphoric Madness 7. Evoken Vulgarity 8. Retribution in Eternity

Links:
Hooded Menace Official