Style: progressive black metal, atmospheric black metal, doom metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: The Ruins of Beverast, Enslaved
Country: Australia, United Kingdom, Belgium, Finland
Release date: 13 February 2025

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The epic poet attempts to represent a culture at a moment in its history, speaking to and curating the identity of a people. The works of such poets have inspired the cultural imagination of humans across the world for millennia, and the lengthy, elevated tales of war, love, adventure, and introspection capture humanity’s proclivity for music, story, and purpose. Having an epic is practically a rite of passage for a civilization, and the form transcends time and place: India’s Ramayana and Mahabharata, Homer’s Hellenic duo, Omeros of St. Lucia’s Derek Walcott, Joyce’s Modernist epic novel Ulysses, the Persian Book of Kings. That the oldest known work of literature is the Mesopotamians’ epic poem The Epic of Gilgamesh is no surprise—it is over four thousand years old, based on a (probably) real Assyrian king, and lays the blueprint for the most human of literary forms. 

Although the lyrical qualities of poetry lend themselves well to be transformed into music, only a select few metal bands can convey the scope and power of an epic effectively.¹ Orchestrated by Swords of Dis, the new I, Voidhanger Records split/collaboration From the Waters of Death aims to faithfully retell The Epic of Gilgamesh; to tackle that seminal work of literature requires four bands, each already renowned for their interminable, self-indulgent compositional style. The mammoth eighty-four minute album closely follows the original narrative—the majority of the lyrics are dialogic—taking very few creative liberties with the storytelling. So, is the music appropriately grandiloquent and, well, epic?

Although a split between four bands, the sound on From the Waters of Death is coherent, with the varying shades of black, doom, and death metal the artists play all melding into a single sound with different faces. Creating the strongest musical throughline is Alice Corvinus (Swords of Dis), whose dramatic and charismatic vocal performance appears on all five songs. She ranges all over the place—both performing as the main narrator of the story and portraying every female character—and her voice shifts textures accordingly. At times she sings with operatic cleans, and at others it’s snarled harshes; she wails seductively as the prostitute Shamhat (tracks one and two²), and passionately sings with an evil disposition with a frenzied change in timbre as Humbaba, devil guardian of the cedar forest (track three). My favorite moment of hers is just past two minutes into track three, as she powerfully invokes the god of the sun, Shamash. Dis Pater (Midnight Odyssey) and Jarno Nurmi (Serpent Ascending) both provide vocals as a variety of characters on several tracks, the two taking turns as Gilgamesh himself, and Guillaume Cazale’s (Ôros Kaù) throaty, wet growls suit the mood of track two, in which Gilgamesh battles his soon-to-be brother Enkidu, soon thereafter preparing for their epic battle against Humbaba. The three male vocalists are of varying singing skill, but I find them all to be charming for this style of black metal. Additionally, since the lyrics are almost entirely a stream of dialogue, the vocal lines throughout the album can be slightly hindered by the cadence of the words, but as a musical version of an epic poem, that hardly matters; the album must be thought of as a recitation of a slightly adapted epic more than as a traditional album to gain complete enjoyment of it. 

With that in mind, the music is best judged as background for the narrative recitation, one undoubtedly full of peaks and valleys. Swords of Dis’ two tracks, which sum to about half of the total runtime, fit the tale best by adding in a range of Turkish, North African, and Middle Eastern instruments: darbuka, bendir, paz, oud, saz, santur, duduk, ney, setar, and tar. The instrumentals—and Alice Corvinus’s melismatic vocal affectation—do an excellent job of conjuring the Mesopotamian vibe, similar to the magnificent Wyatt E. album from last year. Zooming out, all four bands progress through tracks with unpredictable changes in tempo, dynamics, and style, mirroring the massive scope and tumultuous nature of the source material; but, the extended folky interludes in Swords of Dis’ are once again the most engaging dynamic shifts. The track from Ôros Kaù, black metal offshoot of Neptunian Maximalism, inherits all of his main project’s weirdness, the freaky, dissonant black metal riffs spiraling in maniacal patterns like Panegyrist, warping space and time in a desert mirage. The track’s black metal emphasis matches the violent plotline, too. Track one, from Serpent Ascending, builds in labyrinthine structure with a gothy haze like The Ruins of Beverast, and while the blast beats near the track’s climax don’t necessarily match the story at that point (Enkidu, wild beast turned man, is in the planning stage to go and stop Gilgamesh’s reign of terror), they’re ascendant musically.

That leaves track five, and Midnight Odyssey has the unfortunate burden of covering half of the epic’s plotline in a mere twenty-one minutes. While known for his sublime cosmic black metal, Dis Pater also has a desert-themed album under his belt (Biolume Part 2: The Golden Orb), and he channels this facet of his sound—swirling synthesizers, chanted clean vocals, and dry atmospheric black metal—to create a dreamy, immersive soundscape. The abridged version of what Midnight Odyssey has to cover: At this point, Gilgamesh’s brother, Enkidu, has just died, and the protagonist has become hyper-aware of his own mortality, so he seeks immortality. After a long quest to speak to an immortal in the mountains, confronting scorpions and gatekeepers, a major tantrum, challenges from ancients, and finding a plant of immortality, Gilgamesh still fails his quest and must confront his own mortality. During his introspection, he decides to rule Uruk with a kind heart henceforth. That is an insane slice of narrative arc for one musician to cover, and although I think that if anybody has the introspective, moody, and—most importantly—long-winded storytelling and music-making for the job it’s Dis Pater, he still doesn’t succeed fully. Track five is a stellar song with its slow buildup, epic peak, and surreal resolution, but ultimately an unsatisfying narrative conclusion after over an hour of meticulous details—even if the rollicking black metal and sandstorm of blast beats fit the confrontation with mortality, and the ethereal vocals and heavenly synths imitate the sage acceptance Gilgamesh has gained. 

From the Waters of Death is ambitious, full of oddly paced, strange forms of black and doom metal, and it’s absolutely exhausting to listen to in full—although necessary as a direct retelling of an entire story. People may have problems with the vocals and the length, but the epic poem represents an entire people: Gilgamesh is the pinnacle of Mesopotamian culture, of human expression four thousand years ago, so it deserves the time required for a full retelling. Any musical flaws are remnants of a project that has an unwavering respect for its source material. These four bands are modern-day nārum (ancient Assyrian bards), and their retelling gives immense and modern character to an old classic with a menagerie of instruments the Assyrians couldn’t fathom. I’m sure the Mesopotamians would appreciate this retelling—I do at least—and I highly recommend reading The Epic of Gilgamesh to learn more about a fascinating people.

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Recommended tracks: Swords of Dis – From Egalmah They Rode Toward The Howling Cedars Where The Blood Of Beasts Is Spilled And The Silence Of A Scorned God Cracks The Earth; Midnight Odyssey – From The Setting Of The Sun And Through The Waters Of Death, The Faraway, Uta-Napishtim, Lies Hidden; Ôros Kaù – Into The Wailing Darkness They Fell, Where The Mouth Of Fire Awaits; Serpent Ascending – Aruru Births The Lord Of The Wilderness
You may also like: Panegyrist, Wyatt E., Esoctrilihum, Kostnatění, Tempestuous Fall
Final verdict: 8/10

Related links: Bandcamp
– Facebook: Midnight Odyssey / Swords of Dis / Ôros Kaù / Serpent Ascending
– Instagram: Midnight Odyssey / Swords of Dis / Ôros Kaù / Serpent Ascending

Label: I, Voidhanger Records

From the Waters of Death is:
Midnight Odyssey:
– All music written and performed by Dis Pater
– Lyrics written by Dis Pater and Alice Corvinus
– Dis Pater : all instruments, aggressive vocals, male vocals and additional coral vocals, portraying Gilgamesh – King of Uruk, Urshanabi, The Narrator and Uta-Napishtim
– Alice Corvinus : all female vocals, aggressive vocals ad additional/operatic vocals, portraying Siduri

Swords of Dis:
– All music and lyrics written and performed by Swords Of Dis
– Alice Corvinus : all female vocals, aggressive vocals and additional/operatic vocals, portraying the goddess Ishtar, Ninsun, Belet-Seri – Scribe Of The Queen Ereshkigal, Humbaba & The Narrator.
– Richard Corvinus : acoustic guitars, rhythm guitars, lead guitars, bass guitars, drums, orchestration, darbuka, bendir, paz, oud, saz, santur, duduk, ney, setar and tar
– Guillaume Cazalet : aggressive vocals, male operatic and dhrupad vocals, portraying Gilgamesh – King Of Uruk
– Dis Pater : aggressive vocals, male vocals and additional vocals, portraying Enkidu – The Feral Man

Ôros Kaù:
– All music written and performed by Guillaume Cazalet
– Lyrics written by Guillaume Cazalet, Richard Corvinus and Alice Corvinus
– Guillaume Cazalet : electric rhythm guitars, lead guitars, bass guitars, aggressive vocals, additional/operatic vocals, portraying Gilgamesh – King of Uruk and The Narrator
– Richard Corvinus : drums
– Alice Corvinus : all female vocals & additional/operatic vocals, portraying Ninsun and Shamhat

Serpent Ascending:
– All music written and performed by Jarno Nurmi
– Lyrics written by Jarno Nurmi and Alice Corvinus
– Jarno Nurmi : additional clean guitars, lead guitars, aggressive vocals, clean vocals, portraying Enkidu – The Feral Man, The Narrator & The Trapper
– Richard Corvinus : electric rhythm guitars, lead guitars, bass guitars, clean guitars, drums & aggressive vocals, portraying Gilgamesh – King of Uruk
– Alice Corvinus : all female vocals & additional/operatic vocals, portraying Shamhat

1. Some highlights: Symphony X – “The Odyssey” and “Paradise Lost,” Iced Earth – “Dante’s Inferno,” Blind Guardian – “And Then There Was Silence” (Iliad), Mournful Congregation – “The Book of Kings,” Grand Magus – Sunraven (Beowulf) ↩︎
2. Go read the recommended tracks to see why I’m not spelling them all out. ↩︎