Sadhaka is a melodic black metal band from Portland, Oregon, formed in 2011. Their music interweaves elements of black metal, melodic death metal, doom, experimental, and crust, evoking themes of grief and loss, primordial states of consciousness, and the living sentience of the nonhuman world.
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I was very excited when I first stumbled upon the demo recordings of 3 of the songs from this album on Sadhaka's bandcamp. After listening through the songs I was able to classify Sadhaka as an excellent up and coming black metal band and in particular to my favourite type of black metal...Yes some people do not seem to like it but I for one love the atmosphere and imagery it creates. It simply stirs my imagination. The first passage in the song "Dissolution" is absolutely magical. It really is a wonderful, haunting passage.
For the most part the music is a little more "typical" black metal if we take into consideration the members of this band and what other bands they are from. Two of the members are from my favourite Cascadian band "Fauna." Fauna's music is definitely a very different kind of black metal. It is heavily ritualistic and has lots of acoustic passages. Sadhaka takes a more traditional path when it comes to the black metal sound yet they still have that undeniable trademark "cascadian black metal" sound. The third member is an excellent addition. It is a woman from a lesser known one man(woman) black metal band "Mollehoj." Her background voice in the music adds a wonderful warm and almost comforting tone to the songs. The rest of the vocals are done by Joshua from Fauna. I have always found his vocals to be very unique when it comes to black metal. They are very primitive sounding moans and howls yet sometimes decipherable. I have always liked his vocal work on Fauna albums and so I have no complaints only praise for the vocals on this album.
Throughout each song there are wonderful melodic and passionate sounding passages that make this music special. I feel that this genre of black metal is without a doubt less "dark, evil, grim" compared to what many people think that black metal is. Whenever people hear that I like black metal they always instantly assume it is just chaotic and dissonant noise and all about satanism. It can be frustrating at times because while I do enjoy many bands that do dwell in those dark realms, I wish it would be easier for people to understand that that is definitely not all that black metal is. By listening to this album for example I do not feel much darkness, or grimness. Certainly there is a sense of longing but there is no "evil" hanging over this kind of music. Depending on the mood, this album can actually be rather uplifting to the spirit and create a sense of joy. l guess my main point is that if people were to listen to this album they would see that black metal isn't all doom and gloom all the time. People would see that there is most definitely a beauty and haunting almost romantic appeal to it as well. This album and this band definitely have showcased that kind of feeling in their music.
Overall, I think this is an excellent first album, that never really seems to feel dull regardless that this type of black metal is now being played rather often in the black metal world. I think there are some bands that can play this kind of music very well and others that cannot. Sadhaka definitely are of the former and are a welcome addition to the cascadian black metal family. /link