Caronte - Spiritvs (2025)
By Flork
Just a few nights ago, Italy’s Caronte came to vist us metalheads here in Slovakia, playing a gig in the small city of Nitra rather than the capital of Bratislava. Unfortunately, I was unable to make it to the show (a bit of situational fat and laziness barred me from getting off the couch), but my colleague (Tom/EZR) from Jablka caught their performance and came back with high praise *. And so, after a six-year-long wait in the shadows, it seems that Caronte have not only returned to touring in our neck of the woods, but have also returned with Spiritvs, their fifth studio album. I regret my poor life choices as I would have loved to have seen the show too, since Spiritvs is Caronte at full power: a band that understands the weight of ritual and the allure of the forbidden, like everyday is a zombie apocalypse. They are a killer band and their latest release is killer too—fierce, focused, and unrelenting.
Opening with Scarlet Love (at least on the Bandcamp site), the album begins fast and heavy. It‘s raw, sensual mysticism at play here, with no hint of a whisper, but rather an invocation. I love it from the get-go, as it isn’t the slow and sludgy sounds typically associated with doom, but more like doom after several trips to Starbucks. The momentum defies the genre's typical crawl. It’s occult rock not as a genre, but rather a spiritual experience. From the howling mysticism of Aiwass Calling to the astral explosion of Sagittarius Supernovae, the band plays like they‘ve found the edge of the known universe and brought something back with them. Fire Walk With Me, the album‘s longest track, is a slow descent into Lynchian dream horror—a dirge that builds and burns across more than seven minutes, evoking dread and awe in equal measure.
But it’s Interstellar Snakes of God that feels like the album’s central summoning (at least this author thinks so). The title alone is pure cosmic doom poetry—impossibly vast, vaguely heretical, and dripping with celestial venom. The track itself pulses like some kind of divine serpent set loose in the stars, where Caronte finds themselves at their most expansive and apocalyptic. It absolutely delivers.
Even with all its astral ambition, Spiritvs remains grounded in what makes Caronte work. They blend simple, effective arrangements with a ritualistic rhythm section, and vocals that hover between chant and prophecy. If I got my intel on them correct, the album was recorded across both Italy and Sweden by Tore Stjerna, who managed the production and retained the rawness of the band’s live performances. This isn’t doom that hides behind reverb, but rather doom that breathes, sweats, and stares you dead in the eye.
And the Flork man’s prognosis? The wait was well worth it. Caronte isn’t chasing trends—they’re following visions. And so, Spiritvs feels less like an album and more like a transmission from beyond, within, or from wherever the veil thins. If you’re into doom that moves and burns fast as well as leaves ritual smoke in its wake, this album belongs in your collection—and possibly your book of magic spells.
* Tom/EZR: I've been following Caronte on their Thelema shamanic doom journey since their Ascension album dropped in 2012 via Ván Records. This was my first time seeing them live — and boy, did they deliver! A super tight performance from the Bones bros & co. This is exactly the kind of darkpunk-infused occult doom that puts a twist in my lederhosen, no matter how hard I try to stay calm and just enjoy the show. Granted, I caught only about 40% of the set — mostly during high-headbanging moments when my eyes were open — but I made up for the missed visuals by chatting with the Caronte crew, who turned out to be amazing and super friendly bunch of characters. From now on, if Caronte is playing anywhere within a 666km radius, there’s no excuse not to show up.
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