Here is a review of `Spectre of the eight ropes` from Metalitalia.com
(Italian web site, English translation below)
The fact that fourteen years have passed between this new “Specter of the Eight Ropes” and the previous “Under the Black Cross” says a lot about how lucky we can be to be able to listen to unpublished Pentacle songs today. The long waits for the publication of a full-length, only occasionally punctuated by the release of EP or split, are a characteristic feature of the Dutch group’s career, however fourteen years remain a huge amount of time, so much so that the hopes of finding each other sooner or later a new record was becoming exclusive to a few fanatics. At the same time, however, a careful gestation has always been one of the great qualities of Pentacles, always capable of manufacturing works of remarkable quality and punctually recognizable in their being foreign to any prevailing trend. Does not deny this “Specter …”, a work composed by expert hands that is a precise index of the constancy of the band of the Netherlands. The quartet has a decidedly superior talent for starting from very simple bases (Celtic Frost, the very first Death) and in assorting harmonies and new riffs on them, interpreting everything with an innate verve and personality. The value of the Pentacles, even in this LP, is to be able to highlight this talent on compositions that continually fluctuate between ignorant midtempo, from which the frosty influence emerges overwhelmingly, and rapid accelerations that instead find more points of contact with death metal of the first wave. It is a songwriting edited in the best way, that of the Dutch death metallers, from which emerges both an overflowing impetus of an old school matrix, as well as a timely deliberation in the architecture and management of the number of riffs and time changes per song, which makes the proposal dynamic without compromising that typical rebel character of the group. Wannes Gubbels and his companions have unquestionably talent in composing pieces that are remembered, taking for example the great classics of the past, where each song could boast its own individuality. It is an innate attitude that is fully confirmed in various episodes of “Specter …”: “I Christen Thee Doom!”, “Blessed by Fire” and “(Emerging from) A Sea Ablaze)” are in fact definitive synthesis of this for which the four have always been committed and probably these traces will find place in the lineup of the concerts from here until the end of the career of these veterans. Of course, not all the songs presented here are of the same caliber, but, if we consider the long wait, the glass must certainly be seen as half or almost full. Just like colleagues Asphyx, Sadistic Intent or Aura Noir, all of which can be joined to them in style and attitude, the Pentacles never give up and the sincerity of this return speaks more than any high-sounding statement.
