Style: Black metal, progressive black metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Tribulation, Enslaved, Dark Funeral, Immortal
Country: Latvia
Release date: 30 January 2026

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In Latvian folklore, the lietuvēns is the soul of a person who’s murdered (typically by strangling, drowning, or hanging) or that of an unbaptized child that attacks and tortures both people and animals; sleep paralysis is often thought to be the work of a lietuvēns. If you have experienced sleep paralysis, you understand why this is such a disturbing experience: total loss of motor function alongside an ominous sense of dread while sensing a malevolent presence. If this happens to you next time, try the Latvian trick of moving a toe of your left foot, the surefire way of casting out a lietuvēns. With the debut album, Macabre Luxuria, from the Latvian black metal act Pits, will we gladly succumb to their musical smothering? Or will we be wiggling our left toes in search of relief?

Pits brandish a form of black metal that attacks the listener with a variety of approaches rather than simple, monotonous blast beats and constant tremolo picking. Of course, these fiery, traditional black metal sections exist, like the blazing opening of “Night City Delirium” and “No God Can Stop a Hungry Man”. Within Macabre Luxuria, Alex Prokofyev’s range on guitars finds plenty of opportunity to spread its wings. By frequently incorporating acoustic and melodic sections throughout the album, the black metal onslaught is broken up, coming in waves rather than a constant surge. In doing so, Prokofyev gently lures you in with the soft acoustic sections of “Night City Delirium”, the clean, phase-shifting guitar of “Midnight Possession”, and a slow, melodic solo in “Non Licet Bovi”. 

While these clean and melodic passages provide texture and reprieve from the black metal mania of Macabre Luxuria, they come at the cost of musical coherence. The album lacks a natural flow, as the musical transitions are frequently sudden and unsettling. In “No God Can Stop a Hungry Man”, in one moment there is an isolated clean guitar, and in the next, an explosion of black metal fury without warning or a clear musical transition. Successful musical transitions do exist on the album, though, as a clean guitar and bass-led section at the end of “Dead Man’s Letter” fluidly ushers in the beginning of the mid-tempo “Nero’s Blues”. Pits’ future efforts should focus on similarly connecting neighboring passages consistently, providing a more unified listening experience.

Opposed to Pits’ musical variety, vocalist Andrey Nyarl has the consistent, menacing snarl of a vampire emerging from his crypt after a long slumber. Nyarl has a steady presence throughout the album, though the lack of diversity in his approach grates on the listener as the album progresses. The juxtaposition of constant musical back-and-forth and the relatively flat-lined approach of Nyarl can be heard in “Nero’s Blues”, where the atmosphere in the softer section does not match Nyarl’s menacing presence. Though these vampires are unlikely to welcome clean singing into their den, incorporating different approaches like eerie whispers or even spoken word may have fit the mood changes present in the music.

Ultimately, the incoherent back-and-forth from soft clean to black metal sections results in the forty-minute runtime feeling much longer. Macabre Luxuria demonstrates a new band struggling to find their sound, torn between traditional black metal and clean melodies. Individually, the musical sections are often compelling, and once Pits find their musical voice and are able to seamlessly connect their varying musical ideas, great things may lie ahead of these Latvians. So far, though, keep those left toes wiggling. 

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Recommended tracks: Night City Delirium, No Man Can Stop a Hungry Man, Nero’s Blues
You may also like: Dark Fortress, 1349, Wormwood, Necrophobic, White Ward
Final verdict: 5/10

Related links: Bandcamp | Facebook

Label: Independent Release

Pits is:
– Alex Prokofyev (guitars)
– Andrey Nyarl (vocals)
– Alex Potapov (bass)
– Rodion Belshevits (drums)