Band:	Sorcerer
Album:	The Crowning Of The Fire King
Style:	Epic doom metal
Release date:	October 2017

01. Sirens
02. Ship Of Doom
03. Abandoned By The Gods
04. The Devil's Incubus
05. Nattvaka
06. Crimson Cross
07. The Crowning Of The Fire King
08. Unbearable Sorrow

Recently I have been thinking to write a new review because it had been a while since my last one. The question then was: Which album to review next? I checked the list of my favourite albums of 2017 and noticed only 1 of my 5 favourites was featured here on Metal Storm. This one.

To be honest, I had never heard of Sorcerer, so The Crowning Of The Fire King was my first Sorcerer experience. And what a great experience it was.

Let's start with the production of this record. It's excellent - the guitars have a nice raw and heavy sound on this album. The drums have a nice deep sound without drowning out the clarity of the actual hits on the drums. Bass and vocals are mixed in perfectly. And vocals are exactly what I want to talk about next. They are simply amazing! A lot of doom bands have a singer with a deep and dark tone. Well? this is the opposite of that. They feel truly unique. The closest comparison I can think of is former Black Sabbath/Empire singer Tony Martin. Congrats, Anders Engberg; you've become one of my favourites now.

Sorcerer not only delivers fantastic vocals; there are some great riffs and solos throughout the album. The album has the right pace throughout the entire run time. Bass work is on point, adding to the overall deep and dark sound of the album, and the drums complement the other instruments well.

Lyrics wise, The Crowning Of The Fire King delivers solid work. There is one standout song in this department in my opinion, though, and that's "Unbearable Sorrow". This track has become one of my all-time favourites. Not only are the aforementioned lyrics superb, but the overall mood and heartfelt performances (especially in the vocal department) are absolutely brilliant. What an ending to an already great album.

That's a lot of praising so far, you might think. But it's deserved. Most of the things I can criticize this album for are just minor nit-picks. "Nattvaka," for example, is a nice intermission, but doesn't really add too much to the overall experience in my opinion. "Abandoned By The Gods" and "Crimson Cross" are good songs, but they don't grab my attention as much as the other tracks on this album. In fact, I bought the limited-edition version, which has two bonus tracks, "Disciples Of The Dark" and "Bringer Of Misery". Those songs could have easily replaced "Abandoned By The Gods" and "Crimson Cross" for me on the standard album.

Again, those are minor nit-picks on an album that I absolutely love. I posted a comment on the album page after I had heard the album a couple of times back in 2017. Since then I can safely say that I've grown even more fond of this record. I've moved it up from 4th to 2nd place on my 2017 list simply because it's an album that I found myself listening to more frequently than the other two that used to be in front of it. I definitely recommend The Crowning Of The Fire King. Give it a listen, it's really good!