Album Review: Golgotha – Spreading The Wings Of Hope (Ardua Music)

Stepping once more from the shadows, Golgotha, the artisans of doom and desolation have returned. Their new album, ‘Spreading The Wings Of Hope’ will be released on both CD and cassette by Golgotha’s new label, Ardua Music on June 14th, 2024.

When Golgotha come around, the hope and expectation that most will have is that they bring the beautiful misery that they are renowned for. Continuing their epic march into deep darkness where little light can be found, offering up sombre tones, and making the gloominess seem somehow bright.

They are masters of melancholic heaviness, and once again, they deliver something profoundly affecting and decisively doomy.

A haunting and atmospheric start leads into a cavernous showcase of melodies, molasses-covered instrumental heaviness, and vocals that jump from powerful smoothness to garish growls. It’s For Every Tear and the sorrow comes through strongly from the start.

That being said, this album isn’t completely shrouded in darkness, Golgotha have lit a flame, and while it’s weak and barely illuminating much, it does bring with it some hope.

A hope that makes a track like Gilded Cage more rhythmically dramatic, a hope that makes a track like A Solitary Soul more atmospheric even as the heaviness threatens to snuff it out, and a hope that enhances the concentrated melodies and bursts of intensity that comes from Hear Their Cries. Each still feels emphatically bleak, but Golgotha make that bleakness so palatable.

There’s a reason why their name is spoken with such reverence and with this album, they prove again that their doom-infused creativeness is on another level completely. Human Vultures has the pervasive power to make you cry, Closed Heart oozes thick and sticky levels of tumultuous despair, and the title track burns with passionately portrayed heavy doom focus. Another series of exceptional tracks from Golgotha.

All leading to arguably the most mentally and spiritually draining track of all, Hope As Guide. The flame is still burning, and here it becomes clear that it will never truly go out while Golgotha make music like this. Melancholic and beautiful doom at its absolute finest.

Golgotha – Spreading The Wings Of Hope Track Listing:

1. For Every Tear
2. Gilded Cage
3. A Solitary Soul
4. Hear Their Cries
5. Human Vultures
6. Closed Heart
7. Spreading The Wings Of Hope
8. Hope As Guide

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