RSS Feed


SPELL
Wretched Heart

Bad Omen (2026)
Rating: 7.5/10

Canadian band Spell is an outfit I’ve followed since their debut album, The Full Moon Sessions, emerged in 2014. Since then they’ve remained consistent in their ability to craft engaging heavy rock and Wretched Heart is the fifth full-length from the Vancouver-based quartet.

With another ten bouts of Gothic yet pastoral slices of metallic poetry, Spell remain coolly mesmeric. Lyrically, there’s something so immersive, deftly forlorn yet rich when one explores a track like ‘Lilac’. “And you’re already there, Your perfume fills the air, But spring has just begun, How can I keep you? And gold can never rival, Your touch or haunting smile, But if I turn away, How can I make you stay?” swoons vocalist and bassist Cam Mesmer. It’s all darkly romantic with strong wafts of Ghost and Nosferatu.

Okay, so I’m not fully on board with the whole occult rock thing when it all becomes so similar, but Spell really does engage, especially with the mystical guitar work. However, Spell stirs its cauldron well, sprigging with a manner of ingredients from sickly emo to prog, but with a general 70s hard rock merging with 80s coffin dwelling Goth vapours. In fact, one can smell the patchouli oil and hear the creak of leather trousers right from the off with ‘Dark Inertia’. With synthesizers and shadowy melodies there’s a successful meeting of the aforementioned Ghost alongside legendary UK rain dancers The Sisters Of Mercy and The Mission.

Spell never invades the space of the listener and instead slithers with elegance into the ear canal corridors, never once going in for the kill but just remaining to haunt. Maybe it is that defining lack of punch which is to the detriment of Spell, because while the Ghost-like dreamery is enticing, I am on occasion a bit unfulfilled. Even so, Wretched Heart is still a quality album even if its haunting capacity is residual, Spell becoming truly bewitching with their bass lines, with both ‘Unquiet Graces’ and ‘Take My Life’ showcasing the sublime finger work of Mesmer.

The hardened rockers among you might think that Wretched Heart is just a powdery Goth rock album, but a song like ‘Oubliette’ will bring reassurance of Spell as a metallic force too as riffs tumble in timely reaction to the hard drums. It’s as heavy as the album gets because Spell prefers to enchant with a subtler brand of rock, usually drifting with vaporous melodies that hint at Mercyful Fate yet without the satanic spikiness or blood-drenched steel.

‘Iron Teeth’ is a gem, opening with theatrical keyboards and unravelling as a fluid rocker. There’s no doubting that Spell has mesmeric properties; every chiming chord flowing like golden honey. And boy, do these guys know how to write infectious choruses. In fact, so many earworms are crafted here, the standout being ‘Exquisite Corpse’ which is the sort of H.I.M.-styled rock I’d usually laugh at and ridicule, but oh no, not here. This is dark rock from a band which deserves more attention.

Five albums in and Spell remain on the cult precipice of Ghost-a-likes, a burden they really should be shifting away from, but as it stands, Wretched Heart is another hypnotic entry in their repertoires in spite of being a phantom of familiarity.

Neil Arnold

<< Back to Album & EP Reviews



Related Posts via Categories
Share