Cardinal Wyrm unveiled time-lapse video of »Devotionals« cover painting; fourth full-length album out now

Bay Area-based doom metal trio Cardinal Wyrm self-released their fourth full-length album, »Devotionals«, on December 11th, 2020. The album is available now digitally and as limited edition tape.
Cardinal Wyrm has also unveiled time-lapse video of »Devotionals« cover painting, which was done by Kim Diaz Holm.
Holm comments: “In early 2019 my friends in Cardinal Wyrm asked me to do another album cover for them. I jumped at the chance, since I love the band, and loved the result on 2016’s »Cast Away Souls«. But this time it was different. Instead of waiting for me to deliver the last pieces of the package while figuring out my mental health, they needed the cover done… like yesterday. No deadline, just now. I don’t know the specifics, but their first plan for a cover had suddenly failed.
So I laid an ambitious plan. I would receive the music for the finished album, but not listen to it before I started working, and set aside an 8 hour workday. At the start of the day, I’d press play on the album, and listen to it on repeat while improvising the art for the album all in oil, in one go.
Unfortunately, once I was done, the album did not release immediately. I don’t know what happened, but somehow the label back out, and Cardinal Wyrm had too look around for someone to publish it. After looking for almost two years, they decided to self publish it, and released it to cassette to some pretty glowing reviews.
But this video is not about that. This is what happened late January 2019 when I pressed play, and the 8 hours it took to complete the work on the cover art for Cardinal Wyrms »Devotionals«.
I’m very pleased and proud.”
Courtesy of Earsplit PR:
Following the recent release of Oakland-based doom trio Cardinal Wyrm’s fourth album, »Devotionals«, a time-lapse video of the album’s striking cover art being painted by Kim Holm has been released.
Cardinal Wyrm is embodied by lead vocalist/drummer Pranjal Tiwari (S.C.R.A.M.), bassist/vocalist Leila Abdul-Rauf (Vastum, Terebellum, Hammers Of Misfortune, Fyrhtu), and guitarist/vocalist Nathan A. Verrill (Terebellum, Fyrhtu). The follow-up to their »Cast Away Souls« album, released via Svart Records in 2016, »Devotionals« can be described as heavy, intricate, driving, progressive, and genre-bending music that seeks to tell a story.
»Devotionals« was recorded and mixed by Greg Wilkinson at Earhammer Studios (Necrot, Vastum, Brainoil) and mastered by Brad Boatright at Audiosiege (Obituary, Sunn O))), Vastum). The record features striking cover artwork by Kim Holm, photography by Michael Thorn and Amy Oshit, and layout/design by Shelby Lermo.
»Devotionals« is available on limited edition cassette and digital at Bandcamp where the album is streaming in its entirety.
Tracklisting:
01. Gannet
02. Mrityunjaya
03. Imposter
04. Selimesh
05. Canticle
06. Abbess
07. Nightmarchers
08. Do We Have Another Battle Left In Us?
“When sanity fails, weird is the way forward. »Devotionals« ignores both left and right hand paths, taking an off-the-clock magic carpet through doom’s hallowed halls, out of their minds on moonshine and safe in the knowledge that no one else sounds quite like this right now.” – Blabbermouth
“»Devotionals« truly is a work of genre-bending art. A musical performance piece of desperation, hope and collective rallying. The band stated that their wish for this album was to dial it back to DIY roots. The result is an album that is masterful in composition, execution, and packaging. The entirety of »Devotionals« is something to behold.” – Last Rites
“A strange thing happens when one encounters »Devotionals« in repeat fashion. Usually with records, the more you hear, the more you know, but Cardinal Wyrm manage to answer engagement with nuance, and there always seems to be something else to hear… Cardinal Wyrm find persona in grim intricacy, tearing limbs off different microgenres to construct a monster of their own.” – The Obelisk
“There is something deliciously wrong with Cardinal Wyrm’s idea of doom metal that sounds absolutely right. As if phase-shifted just slightly out of our reality, the music of the Bay Area trio murmurs with a strange inflection, creating a loose and rambunctious sound that is as psychedelic as it is menacingly direct.” – PopMatters
“Although rooted in the more traditional sense of doom metal, Cardinal Wyrm take this concept, and push those boundaries, exploring the paths of noise-rock, deathrock and sludge.” – The Sleeping Shaman
“»Devotionals« is in a class of its own this year: there’s not much else you’re going to hear that sounds like this. It’s traditionally-oriented doom metal, but with a strange sense of melody and an epic posture that combine to create a take on the genre that’s refreshingly alien – melodic, riffy, and even blackened-feeling (in tonality, not tempo) at times.” – Invisible Oranges
Bojan Bidovc // music enthusiast, promoter, misanthrop and sometimes a journalist as well