Rating: 9.5/10
Release: 22 November 2024
Label: Independent / Bandcamp

A new album was finally released some weeks ago from the Goblin Hovel after two years – and trust me, none of their work’s similar to the new one. More than 20 minutes out of 52 are in the form of a narration of adventures and misfortunes of a Goblin collective, inspired by the “March of the Goblins” by Italian project “Tha Goblvnz March” which Gobischkevrot aims to be a continuation of. Surely there’s less music but the story’s just to deep to be ignored or skipped, plus listening to the whole album straight makes songs ten times more powerful. I recall their previous metal album Whatever keeps the Lights On which I enjoyed in its entirety and I felt there was kind of a “common thread” connecting all songs despite the album actually being a “compilation” of acoustic tracks from previous albums turned into metal pieces. The lyrics were based on poetry and philosophical reflections on life and society back then, while this time they fully turned into goblins still making their tales meaningful and with such a deep moral. A bunch of goblins hides in the brew barrels of a wooden ship to reach a hidden spirit who could make a Mountain come alive under the moonlight. Eventually goblins choose to sacrifice themselves at the ritual to become legends and destroy the human world.
As for the music, sound quality has slightly improved since their previous “harvest” but differently from it Gobischkevrot has different models such as blast beats that were completely absent before, or also the romantic jazz ballad in Don’t eat the mushrooms. Despite this most of the influences are similar to their old releases and it’s fine for what it is as it’s pretty hard nowadays to see avant-garde folk metal bands with a banjo player writing creative tales and serious lyrics and yet calling themselves goblins. That’s an unique project to date and I wouldn’t change anything of it.
So in conclusion I suggest all of you to take some time to go and listen to the album from start to finish, because this is where goblins truly take over all the space around them.

Tracklist

1. Ambush 05:20
2. The Cave 02:05
3. Gobischkevrot 03:50
4. The Plan 02:39
5. Voyage of the Grogswiller 04:09
6. The Stowaway 01:22
7. Borokol pt. II 03:34
8. Don’t Eat the Mushrooms 04:34
9. Dialogue with a Mountain 12:30
10. Moon’s Fist 06:08
11. The Night Man Learned to Fear the Mountain 03:02
12. Crineiga 03:34