“Only the vultures will come to see me hang”

The hills of Tyburn ring with the awesome sound of the epicus, the doomicus, and the metallicus on Candlemass’ At The Gallows End. Taken from their second album, 1987’s Nightfall, this is basically about as metal as it gets. Life and death, faith and damnation soundtracked with the legendary Swedish band’s bludgeoning and mournful neo-classical riffage.

As with Iron Maiden’s Hallowed Be Thy Name, the song is narrated by a condemned prisoner facing his final moments on Earth. His doomed musings as he ponders his own personal Golgotha are the perfect fodder for the band’s bleak, weighty style and an ideal vehicle for the band’s new vocalist, operatic frontmonk Messiah Marcolin. He excels here. His singing over the song’s pastoral acoustic passages is wistfully sensitive but he thunders with bombastic defiance over the track’s heavier sections. It’s the kind of performance you can imagine parting the clouds.

At The Gallows End is one of the quintessential Candlemass tracks. It’s an unforgettable masterpiece that, in much the same way as the barbaric and emotive early work of Manowar, induces a very pure metal fervour. Dark, powerful and perfectly executed.