On 2018’s World’s Blood, Wayfarer unveiled an immersive melding of black metal, doom and Americana that epitomised the emergent ‘Denver sound’. Driving that vision further, they return with A Romance With Violence, their most fully realised statement yet. Playing out like a black metal Deadwood, the depravity and hostility of the Wild West feed the grim sonic narrative with equal parts aggression and melancholia, as in the stirring Masquerade Of The Gunslingers.
Tempering its thundering intensity with interludes of folk and mournful atmospherics, A Romance… paints a reverential ode to America’s most colourful era. From the sweeping heights of The Crimson Rider (Gallows Frontier, Act I) to the ragged splendour of closer Vaudeville, A Romance With Violence is a poignant and exhilarating affair that cements Wayfarer as one of American metal’s most vital current voices.
