Karyn Crisis' project GOSPEL OF THE WITCHES was born in 2009 in California. They have released their debut album "Salem's Wounds" back in 2015, and they are now ready to present the sophomore work, "Covenant".

GOTW's type of music revolves around Gothic Rock and Doom Metal. It also shares some NWOBHM elements every here and there, but the two aforementioned styles re the dominant shades in the album. Right from the first tracks, traces of BLACK SABBATH and BLACK LABEL SOCIETY can be heard in the riffs. Karyn's clean vocals reminds me so much of BEYOND THE BLACK's Jennifer Haben.

Although the album launched in a strong attack, that certain spice started to depreciate in the succeeding tracks like "Benevento", "The Hours", "Diana Mellifica" and "Circle of White Light". In the said songs, they relied more on poppy singing and unnecessarily spacey production. Despite that, they also had some golden moments in "Great Mothers" and "Janara" which are easily the most interesting tracks off the album where they have displayed a good combination of heaviness and occasional shifts to lighter vibes.

The closing song "Blood of the Mother" is an undeniable mess - lyrics are out of place, production is terrible, and is simply a waste of space. Although the album only run a total of 48 minutes, the un-engaging mood makes it feel like you've been listening to the album for more than an hour already. Production is just fine, considering they pulled off a decent doom/gothic hybrid. The songwriting is the aspect where they didn't perform very well - lyrics are mediocre and sometimes lifeless.

Dull and uninspired are what would best describe the album as a whole. It had some fine moments where they executed well, but those tracks were buried in the mess created by the rest of the album. Songwriting and production are so uncomfortable and mediocre, and it's not too original either.