Phrenelith // Ashen Womb // Album Review

The Danish leviathan of death metal Phrenelith has returned with their next chapter of brutality.

Formed in 2013 harnessing one of the most dark, brooding & dissonant styles of death metal, the band have created some of the more hideous music the underground has witnessed in some time.

Their now third albums see the band focus on their sound & creating one of the most horrific, diverse & brutal albums in their catalogue to date.

The album’s opening within “Noemata” is a lush & vast landscape of reverb-soaked clean guitar picking. As the track slowly picks up the pace, heavy distorted guitar thickens out the track, serving as a great intro to the album before the band unleashes hell on “Astral Larvae”.

Sounding like its namesake, this track feels out of this world. Using blast beats in tandem with shrieking discordant guitar sections, this track gives you an uneasy yet pummelling feeling simultaneously. Vocalist David Torturdød (Undergang, Sequestrum) deep bellowing guttural vocals fit perfectly within the band’s sound, Deep & dank enough to feel like a gross blanket covering the band but cuts through enough that the performance feels raw & passionate.

A real showcase for the precise talent of drummer Andreas Nordgreen (Chaotian, Sequestrum) is the sheer brutality of drumming on this track that ranges from consistent double kicks, machine-like blasting & great use of cymbal work & little flourishes that keep this track feeling fresh & exciting to focus on his performance.

Now it’s not only Andreas’ performance that is fantastic; the whole band have been able to write & perform one of my highlight tracks on this album. A real driving track but has moments constantly keeping your attention & has you banging that head right away.
As the band closes the album, the title track “Ashen Womb” is a nearly ten-minute sonic journey of the absurd. In its opening moments, it feels like you are trapped in a cold, dark, windy, harsh landscape. With the use of samples, the band creates an unease. With a hammer-like swing, they introduce this thunderous & heavy opening riff that grabs you within the first few bars. The band slowly increases the intensity with layers of effects & haunting melodies before switching on a dime to this all-out blazing blasting section & the chaos begins.

Over its run time the band use tempos & different away to attack the track so create this peaks & valleys or create moments of pure disorder but also give us a section where they can strip everything back to create this clean, haunting section that gives the tracks closing half this driving riffs & melody that quickly becomes an earworm & leaves the listen on a real anthemic high.

Within a sea of death metal in 2025, it’s hard to stand out & create something unique. And that’s why I’ve always revered Phrenelith’s output.
With every release, the band pushes the envelope. Not just within the death metal sound but within the songwriting textbook, trying new & exciting things that make their albums stand out.

“Ashen Womb” is their most encompassing album yet. Filled with the harsh signature sound of European death but also harnessing & using the beauty of doom & ambient to create lush but terrifying landscapes of sound for the listener to sink their teeth into.

Review:Joseph Mitchell

Ashen Womb is out via Dark Descent Records / Me Saco Un Ojo Records on 7th February 2025

Pre-orders are available at:

darkdescentrecords.com (North America)

ddmsuo.eu (Europe)

mesacounojo.com

darkdescentrecords.bandcamp.com

PHRENELITH emerges from the darkness once again with their third and most unholy full-length offering, Ashen Womb. Nine sinister funeral marches, draped in a bleak and blackened atmosphere, provide a lens into the forthcoming end of times.