Review by Levi on March 4, 2024.

The second album of this sick creation created by T.Kaos and Mark of the Devil, whom we know from such hordes as: Lvcifyre, Death Like Mass or Cultes Des Ghoules. This alone should serve as the album recommendation. But not entirely, because Benediction, Part 1 has nothing to do with what these gentlemen create in their parent formations.

The second full length of Sodality is a totally crazy, haunted and thoroughly narcotic thing. It is definitely black metal, rolling through the speakers rather in a slow and medium tempo, thick as tar, and often having a sound of a ritual character. Much of this is due to the vocals and the atmosphere they create. What Mark does with this material is fucking haunting and genuinely evil. He wheezes, screeches, melodizes, whispers, groans, spits out lines of some haunting spells, rituals – awesomeness! This is definitely not an easy-to-understand album that you can listen to and do something on the side. Definitely not. You have to fully embrace the atmosphere here, but with this you should also note, after entering and listening to the whole thing, it may turn out that you’ll emerge from this confrontation with wounds and scars. Really, this music can hurt, but that only proves how brilliant this album is. I had a big problem with previous materials, because somehow they didn't captivate me that much. Whereas the madness and darkness of Benediction, Part 1 drew me inside from first listening. It absorbed me and after a while it spat me out, because after those almost 40 minutes, when I returned to the world of the living, I authentically felt that I had just encountered something really evil, sick and… dangerous.

I commend the creators in Sodality for succeeding to create such a unique, very direct and damn creative album. It is really hard for me to imagine what conditions it was created in and what condition the musicians were in both during creation and recording of Benediction, Part 1. They created a monster. Black metal monster.

Rating: 8.2 out of 10