50 Best Hard Rock & Heavy Metal Albums Of 2017

In 2006, Washington’s avant-garde collective Wolves in the Throne Room revolutionised black metal forever with their acclaimed debut album Diadem of 12 Stars. Adding such elements as ambience and progressive song-writing into the extreme metal style, the record singlehandedly elevated its genre from an OTT sound and image just begging to be parodied, all the way to a juggernaut that, suddenly, those outside the heavy music niche could find sophisticated and worthwhile.

Nearly twelve years down the line, Wolves in the Throne Room’s first disc remains a high that they are yet to recreate the sheer magic of. At least, that would be the case if it wasn’t for Thrice Woven.

This behemoth of atmospheric deliciousness hit metalheads’ doorsteps on the 22nd September, coming after the power trio had spent years in the wilderness away from metal, instead experimenting with their more downbeat and gloomy side, trading rock for drone.

Thrice Woven is Wolves in the Throne Room’s homecoming: an aggressive slice of blackened, folk-inspired metal that harkens back to the band’s halcyon days with big compositions and even bigger guitar parts. A forty-minute disc comprised of only five tracks, this is musical enormity incarnate, each grandiose movement more delectably depressive than the last.

With acoustic guitars and lengthy, atmospheric passages at its disposal, Thrice Woven ebbs and flows beautifully, with all the predictability and safety of an unhinged serial killer.

Finally, Diadem of 12 Stars has found its worthy successor. And it only took a decade or so.