Live Review: Forlorn w/Swarmed and Healing Wound at The Black Heart in Camden!

An album release show at the intimate venue that is The Black Heart in Camden gives Folk Horror Pagan Progressive Metal act Forlorn the opportunity to offer the gift of “Aether” to an unsuspecting World via Church Road Records. As a band, the five piece fronted by Megan Jenkins have been around since 2019, waterfall releasing a collection of singles as they built their reputation for a ritualistic and almost occult live show. In 2023 five songs were collated for EP “Sael” with the band performing at the final Techabilitation event from Tech-Fest. That year also saw them score their biggest single in “Weight Of It All“, a track which has surpassed 187k of Spotify streams alone as they nailed to perfection their signature style.

As an album release show tonight is a truly unique experience, Megan Jenkins performing a smoke cleansing ceremony before an intimate Q&A and listen to “Aether” in full with the band. They discuss with the gathering things like their influences in cinema, how Megan got into unclean vocals and how the album was almost a self release, having been completed in 2023. Remarkably they didn’t feel any pressure going into the studio and fortunately Church Road Records, run by Justine Jones and Sammy Urwin of Employed To Serve came out of the woodwork to distribute the record and the rest as they say is history. The conversation is candid, each member of the band sharing their point of view and being wonderfully honest and open in answering every question, to the point that almost as if we’re enjoying a cup of tea and a piece of shortbread in their living room than sat in a Pub.

Tonight’s show gets started with the relatively fresh blood of Healing Wound [7/10] a band only formed in the summer of 2023. They’ve found a sound that crosses Metal sub-genres from Death Metal through to Hardcore and released not one but two EPs, the latest being “Failures Will Make Serpents Of Us All“. Tonight they offer up raw and feral from the first venom spitting second with cathartic roars of violent anguish over fast and loose guitars accompanied by bombastic Hardcore Punk bass and Black Metal style restless and relentless percussive sounds as if they have something to prove. Their sonic abrasions hit like tremors after an earthquake, each subsequent track progressively more violent and unhinged than the one that came before it as their set reaches an inevitable crescendo, the four piece enduring a blood lust as they’re bathed in the red light of a packed room.

Next up are Swarmed [8/10] who are at the heavier end of DJent fuelled Progressive Metalcore and deliver slab after concrete slab of spine juddering downtuned riffs from eight string guitars interspliced with the occasional ambient moment. To use a cliché their music is the push that makes you move, their rhythmical prowess as brutal and as clinically precise as it gets. December EP “Sun And Void” makes up the backbone of the set as vocalist James Burton steps off the stage and gets involved with the sold out crowd, demanding movement while acting on those instincts himself. Reaching into the void of both Gloom Metal and Deathcore the four piece blur the lines of subgenres with ease while leaving their drummer in a sweaty heap behind the kit. Keep your eyes peeled for this band in the future, they’re ones to watch.

Having personally witnessed Forlorn [10/10] at both Reading Rising and the aforementioned Techabilitation in 2023 we already know they are capable of creating an enchanting, captivating, enthralling and immersive live performance that is an experience which separates them from the wolf pack. Despite the pressure of an album release show and having to hang around a venue to chat to us all afternoon tonight they have their game faces on and soon have the audience under their spell. Swaying like marionettes to the symphony of cuts from the new album as they enrich spine juddering riffs with rich, dark melodies, they hold the room in the palm of their collective hands, cementing their reputation as a fearsome Pagan Folk Horror Metal quintet of power, presence and purpose. Megan Jenkins paints pictures with her lyrical narratives, every inch the siren calling the sailors to death upon the jagged rocks as she switches seamlessly between lush clean vocals and brutal roars through gritted teeth. Each song is well crafted and in perfect balance, the new material building on the foundation of gold and bones of their earlier work. Live every piece fits together as seamlessly as a jigsaw puzzle, those who witness the performance transported to another realm of existence in pure unadulterated escapism by the eerie, haunting melodies and downtuned riffs. The culmination six years of dedication to their craft, tonight everything falls perfectly into place and has not only been worth wait but worth it’s weigh in gold. Something wicked this way comes and the name of the beast is Forlorn…