Hello, friends. Hope you’re having a pleasant Friday.

Here, we’re still slowly but surely shoveling ourselves out from last weekend’s storm, trying our best to keep ourselves warm and keep our pipes from freezing, with recent high temperatures refusing to rise above the tweens (Fahrenheit), and Alexa blinking its caution-colored yellow light at us every day with a new notification about a severe cold warning, with overnight lows hovering around zero or below (also Fahrenheit).

Meanwhile, I haven’t ventured out anywhere since last Saturday morning (to pick up groceries and library books) — in the days since, I’ve only been outside to shovel the front walkway, the driveway, and as much of the surrounding street as I could, given that the borough either felt it was unnecessary to plow all the way to the end of our road OR they were unable to get past our neighbors’ annoying arrays of vehicles parked all over the place.

Nevertheless, without leaving the house or any contact with outsiders, I’ve somehow managed to now find myself practically bedridden with some kind of dreadful sinus infection or cold or perhaps turtle flu. But there’s new music out today and I’d be derelict in my duties if I didn’t take some time out of my day to share it with you folks!

 

Gavran – Indistinct Beacon (Dunk! Records, 02 December 2022)

 

Gavran – The One Who Propels (Dunk! Records, 30 January 2026)

 

A Rotterdammer band whose name means “Raven” in Croatian (and whose song titles are all Croatian words as well), Gavran‘s purpose is described by its members as “to give meaning to our past, present and future. It gives us a way to release our doubts, despair and anger and search for the light at the end of the countless tunnels in our minds. It is a journey we still endeavour and probably will until our end of days. With Gavran we found a way to cope and unravel. It gave us a means to pursue true understanding.”

I first became of these Nederlanders when their album Indistinct Beacon came out in 2022, which swiftly clawed its way into the top ten of my list of that year’s best releases, with its drawn-out post-doom compositions filled with droney chords and stentorian walls of sound. Contrasts between heavily distorted parts with hellishly shrieked vocals and quieter sections with haunting clean vocals (predominantly in “Talas”; also evident in “Duhovi” and “Pesak”) bring to mind a certain band this reviewer was a huge fan of quite a few years ago, who coincidentally happened to be Croatian.

So naturally I was delighted to see the news, earlier this month, that Gavran were coming out with another new release, The One Who Propels, which is available today. This consists of five tracks just like its predecessor, while since 2022 the average length has now grown from ten to twelve minutes; so they’ve leaned ever-so-slightly-more into the epic doom song structures. The dichotomous nature continues to be prevalent as well: thunderous percussion and massive riffs clash with lighter and more atmospheric guitars, hints of space-rock and shoegaze add plenty of color to what would otherwise be an impenetrably dense mass of gloom.

It’s still extremely early, of course — January hasn’t even ended yet — but already it feels safe to at least pencil in another top-ten appearance for this band once 2026 has concluded.

 

 

 

Both albums are available in digital format through Gavran‘s Bandcamp page (see below).
 

 

 

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Gavran: Bandcamp | Youtube
Dunk! Records: website | Bandcamp