Ptahil’s debut EP Ortus is close to 30 minutes of ritualistic, emotionally-scarring black metal dissonance fueled by Satanic Gnosticism. In other words, definitely something you wouldn’t expect to originate from the Midwestern United States. This trio from Fort Wayne, Indiana combines lyrics from ancient medieval sources with hypnotic black noise, the combined effect of which is to beat the listener’s consciousness into a state of meditative appreciation.

The first track, ‘The infinite TRUTH of the WORD of GOD is translated by corrupt fallen man’, alternates between almost grind-like blackened chaos and more standard blastbeats and tremolo riffs before eventually settling into a slow, creepy section with hateful spoken word incantations. If you’re a fan of Deathspell Omega’s slower-paced compositions like Kenose’s ‘I’ or ‘Diabolus Absconditus’, the effect here is quite similar.

The second track is nearly twice as long as the opener, and spends much of its 19 minutes undulating among doomy disharmonic riffs and creepy choral chanting while vocalists Nacht and Luathca spew forth lyrics taken from the 13th century Latin hymn Dies Irae. Rather than adopt the usual black metal screams, these guys employ kind of a damaged yell, which makes Ortus’s sound much more unique and terrifying.

With Ortus, Ptahil have managed to state their dark philosophical convictions succinctly in two very different but equally effective slabs of moody, sprawling black metal. The sinister atmosphere the EP creates and the aptitude with which Ptahil are able to move between different styles and tempos while maintaining the suffocating sense of foreboding that pervades the album are definitely impressive. The emergence of bands like this is definitely a step in the right direction for US black metal.

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