REVIEW: Lord Sin - Confessions

Mysterious Portuguese duo Lord Sin prefer to keep their identities hidden and let the music speak for itself. On new record ‘Confessions’, they do just that. There’s a multitude of reasons as to why the experience of ‘Confessions’ is such a fluid yet lively listen, with each moment flowing from one to the other as if you’re living it whilst it occurs. The record was recorded in a way which is rare in today’s modern music industry - the guitars and drums were recorded by the duo in a single take, with extra instruments such as further guitar takes, bass, keys, and then eventually vocals all added on afterwards. So while the songs are of course planned and aren’t entirely improvised, there’s still that raw element of pure live playing and on-the-spot syncopation throughout.

Recorded at Rock n Raw Studios in Alfornelos in March 2021 by Bruno Jorge, then later mixed and mastered by Ricardo Towkuhsh Rodrigues at ERRE Estudios in September 2022, Lord Sin’s approach makes for a unique and thoroughly exciting listen. That live recording process gives many wonderful little details such as at the beginning of ‘Negligent’, when you can hear a slight soft thud as the drummer gets ready to come in. Then there’s the extremely long, lingering ending of both ‘Guilt’ and ‘Regret’, with the guitar feedback reverberating through the amps. It all feels so live and real, with tiny moments like this that make the record really come to life, to the point that sometimes you can't help but feel as if you're sat in there with them.

Musically, the album sits neatly in the psychedelic doom metal field, but with a few extra elements thrown in and at times a dark electronic vibe that adds a fresh flavour into it all. There’s some phenomenal black metal vocals throughout, at times reminiscent of early Cradle of Filth, although on ‘Living Sin’ we get to hear a different style of vocal delivery for the first time as the singer switches up the style and drops into speaking instead of growling during some of the verses. There’s also some beautifully ethereal, echo-drenched guitar noodling over the top in ‘The Presence’, a catchy guitar on ‘Negligence’ with smooth transitions between growls to more sung vocals tooffer a transcending listening experience, and a melodic, dark, swirling bassline on ‘Living Sin’ which is unexpectedly funky.

Then there’s the church bell and organ introduction on ‘Guilt’ which shakes things up a bit and switches up the atmosphere, almost taking things into a creative, gothic horror landscape with a dark vampire Queen of the Damned feel, and lyrics telling a more fantasy driven tale compared to the others, but still with very relevant meaning that is rooted in the real world. Lyrically, the topics are very relatable – love, life, society, sin, death, guilt, regret – all things that listeners can connect to and topics that bleed out over the course of the album’s interesting lyrical content. There’s some very open, raw and honest moments too such as the line “I need you to hate me, but I love you” on opening track ‘Spectres’.

Hypnotic, rhythmic and epic, there’s only 6 tracks on ‘Confessions’, but every one of

them plays its part. With all of them longer than six minutes and one a whopping 12

minutes and 3 seconds, this is definitely album length – and the perfect length. Some

bands of this style and genre make the mistake of creating overly long albums with

15 songs that drag on for nearly two hours. This, however, leaves listeners still

wanting more without being overwhelmed. ‘Confessions’ is a fantastic record which

the listener can connect with, the type of music that relaxes you deep down in your soul and

keeps you coming back for more.

'Confessions' will be released on December 13th via Larvae Records.

Words: Harley Lorna

Photos: Lord Sin