Këkht Aräkh
Pale Swordsman
Sacred Bones Records
Released: 4/10/21
Version Reviewed: 12″ LP, Reissue, Metallic Silver, Unknown Quantity
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A1 – Intro
A2 – Thorns
A3 – Night Descends
A4 – In the Garden
A5 – Amor
B1 – Nocturne
B2 – Amid the Stars
B3 – Lily
B4 – Crystal
B5 – Swordsman
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Këkht Aräkh quickly drew the attention of the black metal sphere with the enduring translation of second-wave black metal and the combination of acoustic, ambient, and clean elements brought into his compositional structuring. Pale Swordsman is the evolutionary follow-up to the debut, Night & Love, and has since, within its short lifespan, almost become a meme in the heavy metal community. This is not meant as a despairing remark of any sort, but as an indication of how quickly Këkht Aräkh managed to captivate and polarize a scene that was hungry for anything that was willing to try or be something different. In words alone, it is difficult to describe how his appeal and his music’s message won over a swathe of people who fell in love with the message of romanticism and loneliness that was interlaced within his music.
Much like 2019’s Night & Love, Pale Swordsman has seen multiple pressings in its relatively short lifespan, beginning with a full digital release through Finland’s Livor Mortis in April of 2021, followed by a physical release on all formats in June of 2021, a second pressing on all formats followed in November of 2022 by Sacred Bones Records, and the most recent pressing came in October of 2023 on limited-edition digipak slipcase CD which was handled by China’s Pest Productions. As stated in the review for Night & Love, clearly, there is a demand here.
Although, to speak informally for a brief moment, if you do seek out a physical copy on vinyl, be very careful which pressing you seek out, as the version being reviewed right now was initially unplayable out of the sleeve. The center hole was about .010-.015 undersized, causing the record to spin under-speed. The center hole was widened using some calipers and a sharpened pencil being fed into the center hole, tapered end first, until the hole was properly worn into appropriate inner diameter. Problem solved.
As for Pale Swordsman? How does it stand on its own and how does it compare against Night & Love? For starters, it is substantially shorter than its predecessor. Night & Love was over 40 minutes in length, Pale Swordsman comes in at barely over half an hour. The compositional aspects vary to some important degrees; on Night & Love, in some senses, songs felt disjointed and ‘slapped together,’ while Pale Swordsman, the material is much more cohesive, although, the acoustic elements are heavily stripped down. Also missing from Pale Swordsman, are the long ambient tracks that appeared on Këkht Aräkh’s prior effort, tracks such as ‘Night’ and ‘Love,’ whose presence was somewhat debatable to begin with. Suffice it to say, with all the prior statements taken into consideration, Pale Swordsman is a much more streamlined effort all together.
Pale Swordsman opens with ‘Intro,’ a short piano and guitar opener that feeds into ‘Thorns,’ the first proper effort of the album. Much like Night & Love, the keyboard aspect of the introductory track does not fade away with the end of the introduction, but feeds into the first track as a primary compositional instrument. The piano, its primary chord progression, is the backbone for which the remainder of the song is built upon. There is variation thrown into it from the alterations made on the guitar, through both melodic tremolo alteration and open-note chordal rhythmic variation.
‘Night Descends’ continues to demonstrate the streamlined effort of Këkht Aräkh, focusing mostly on primarily a second-wave black metal approach with its simplified chord progression, accompanied layered chordal harmony, circular rhythmic blastbeating, and emphasis on propelling lyrically poetic vocals. Including the first entry of the famous ‘wandering in the night/pale swordsman’ line that recurs several times, thematically, throughout the album.
‘In the Garden,’ is one of the longer efforts on the record and continues to demonstrate the evolutionary traits that Këkht Aräkh has taken on, especially in the aspects of riffcraft, with some flashy arpeggio work, half-time breakdowns, beautiful moments of refrain that allow the bass to shine through, and tasteful transitions. Once again, lyrical themes repeat themselves here, the concepts of the album’s namesake, the Pale Swordsman.
Following ‘In the Garden,’ are a pair of instrumentals, ‘Amor,’ and ‘Nocturne,’ which perhaps make the most sense when experienced on vinyl playback, as ‘Amor,’ a combination of synth, acoustic, and both distorted and clean electric guitar closes out Side A. Side B would then open with another old, ancient sounding piano interlude, ‘Nocturne,’ sonically most similar to ‘Intro,’ compositionally.
‘Amid the Stars’ is the first proper track of Side B and is one of the heavier offerings on Pale Swordsman and continues to lyrically repeat the theme seen across the album thus far. While early chord grinding leads the way, towards the middle of the song, the bass is given center stage while the guitar is briefly reduced to single-note sequences before ramping up to tremolo-based melody. The riff dynamics here are by far some of the most articulated on the Pale Swordman.
‘Lily’ is a bridging instrumental of clean guitar and orchestral bass, flanked by distorted guitar swells and chord stab accents that feeds into ‘Crystal,’ a longer effort that once again demonstrates the evolution in composition and riffcraft that Këkht Aräkh has taken on. The keyboards have once again taken a leading role in the song, and the balance of dissonance and consonance alone, just in this single song, is something that stands out from the rest of Këkht Aräkh’s body of work.
The album closes with ‘Swordsman,’ much like the conclusion of Night & Love, this is also a truly clean track. Comprised primarily of nothing but piano and clean vocals, the poetic lyrics that are delivered feel as if they are closing a concept album.
Much like Night & Love, Pale Swordsman is a record best experienced as a whole. While it is possible to ‘pluck’ songs from the running list, you are robbing yourself of the artistic merits of the record that are only granted through a whole listening experience. There is no sense in stating that Night & Love or Pale Swordsman is one better than the other, as both have their strengths, creative difficulties, and unique perks, but it is certain that Pale Swordsman does mark an advancement in the songwriting and compositional advancements in Këkht Aräkh. While Pale Swordsman lacks the almost haphazard nature of near reckless creativity that was present in Night & Love, it is a much more focused record that possesses better production properties and is indicative of an artist that shows no indication or signs of wavering creatively.
There is a reason why a great many have fallen obsessed with the Pale Swordsman. We will wait to see if there will be another chapter in his story.
Label: Sacred Bones Records
Band: Këkht Aräkh
-AJK
apanthropy 
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