Blood Ceremony are a Stoner Metal band from Toronto Canada. Formed in 2006, the band plays a more melodic take on the genre, incorporating organ, gothic-influenced female vocals, and flute to the expected thick guitar and slow-paced sound. Their songs mainly focus on the occult and Victorian Gothic novels, along with obligatory references to Lovecraft and smoking weed.
Signing with Rise Above Records, the band released their debut Self-Titled Album in 2008, which received fairly positive reviews. Emboldened with some amount of success, they spent the next few years touring across North America and Europe, opening for and playing alongside the Doom Metal giants Electric Wizard.
The band returned to the studio to work on their second album. In 2011, Living with the Ancients was released, earning even more favorable reviews from critics with tighter compositions and better production as contributing factors. Soon after, they resumed touring off and on for the next two years.
After replacing drummers and being signed to the seminal Metal Blade Records, Blood Ceremony completed a third album entitled the Eldritch Dark in 2013.
Yet more touring has followed, making Blood Ceremony a prominent fixture to the Doom Metal scene. With the Eldritch Dark becoming their most financially successful album thus far, their future prospects look promising.
Current members:
- Alia O'Brien - lead vocals, flute, organ
- Sean Kennedy - guitars
- Lucas Gadke - bass, backing vocals
- Michael Carrillo - drums
Former members:
- Chris Landon - bass
- Jeremy Finkelstein - drums
- Andrew Haust - drums
Discography:
- Blood Ceremony - (2008)
- Living Among the Ancients - (2011)
- The Eldritch Dark - (2013)
- Lord of Misrule - (2016)
This band contains examples of the following tropes:
- Black Magic: More or less every song at least touches on the subject. necromancy, human sacrifices on bloody altars, pacts with demons, smoking from Saturn's bong...
- Cover Version: Of Loving You by Iron Claw.
- Folk Metal: The flute and organ are a large part of their sound, though the vocals are far from harsh as in most examples.
- Instrumentals: Each album has traditionally had an acoustic track to break up the heavier material. A Wine of Wizardry on Blood Ceremony, Witch's Dance on Living with the Ancients, Faunus on the Eldritch Dark.
- A Good Name for a Rock Band: The name comes from a Spanish 1972 vampire film called Ceremonia sangrienta.
- Lighter and Softer: Is this to a good few Doom Metal bands, containing quite a bit of melody, clean vocals, and lyrics that aren't as gloomy. Still plenty of dark lyrics and slow, low-tuned riffs to qualify, however.
- Ominous Pipe Organ: O'Brian plays it often in their material, though it's perhaps most memorably used to open the first album track with a section of nothing but tense organ for the first 2-and-a-half minutes.
- Shout-Out: The Eldritch Dark's title comes from a poem written by Clark Ashton Smith.
