Spektr have created a very interesting but also kind of disturbing and morbid sounding releaseat the same time. The french band mixes elements of experimental black, industrial and even ambient music.There are some fast, chaotic guitar riffs blended with industrial noises and sounds that creates a very harsh sound but at the same time the band blends all these elements together for a really good outcome. The band mixes in some aggressive metal with heavier industrialized soundscapes throughout the entire album. It's hard to pick one favourite song as all the songs are really well done and blend together and it's better if you listen to 'Cypher' from start to finish. Spektr is definitely not a band for everyone to enjoy but if you are a fan of industrialized, experimental black metal with some melodic ambient interludes, then you might enjoy listening to Spektr's vision known as 'Cypher'.
“Kill my chances to survive”. Nothing more, nothing less from the Italian depressive blackers Forgotten Tomb and their amazing latest work '…And Don’t Deliver Us From Evil'. All seven songs reveal a depressive, suicidal, pessimistic and melancholic doomy and gothic atmosphere; in other words dark enough for an internal introspection. Forgotten Tomb do call us to fight our own demons, to explore our own inner soul and mind and finally to make a retrospect to our failures, celebrating the emptiness and vanity. However, the album has no intention to allow us forgiving ourselves for what we have done; it is rather a purgatory where everyone goes inside, but no one can leave from this Dante’s vicious cycle of hell.
Leaving aside the lyrical concept of the album and the feelings of vain wandering into the nothingness that it reveals, and from a technical point of view, Forgotten Tomb gives us one major album, perhaps the best album in their career so far. Blasting drums, fast tempo guitar riffs turning to more melodic at some points, bass according to the rhythm, and vocals varying from clean, to throaty growls, and to desperate screams. The Italian’s last work is characterized by astonishing musical compositions, both lyrically and musically, excellent performance, coherent sound, and experimental musical features.
Even after five albums, Forgotten Tomb remains one of the favourite bands that continue to surprise us with their innovations and at the same time with their faithfulness to their original depressive sound and nihilistic ideology. The amazing "Love Me Like You’d Love The Death" is what we dedicate to the band for offering us this album.
Many bands emerged during the ‘90s following the Norwegian black metal genre. However, only few of them are still active and / or faithful to this style nowadays. One of these bands is Ragnarok, introducing us their seventh full-length violent album 'Malediction'.
Unleash the blasphemous beast: fast and attacking guitar riffs, stormy and merciless drums, brutal bass and classic black metal vocals compose the map of this album. The highlight of the album could be the melodic guitar intro on "Dystocratic", making a nice change from the other songs. HansFyrtse and his team from Sarpsborg, Norway offer 45 minutes of blasting music, leaving the listener with feelings of hate and anger against humanity and Christianity. Aggressive and evil, the lyrical content of the ten songs deals with a variety of themes: from the Vikings attack on Lindisfarne Monastery in 793 which set aside the Christian religion, to one’s inner demons and humanity's conflicts, all the way to the wrong operation of democracy - yet always conjuring visions of slaughtered Christian corpses lying at the battlefield.
Rounding things out -'Malediction' is a typical black metal album, almost like the ones doneback in the '90s, with little new to offer us music-wise, but being this technically good it leaves us with nothing to complain about. You have nothing new and experimental to expect from this album, except for furious vocals mixed with stormy instruments. It is about a true raw black metal album, with concrete sound, instrumental balance and flawless execution, which will definitely satisfy all fans of the genre.[8]
Imposing and raw old school black metal blended with melodic riffs from the Greek band Acrimonious and its second work called 'Sunyata', which was released just few days ago from their current label Agonia Records. Faithful to their initial motive, the first song "Nexus Aosoth" offers us a journey to an eerie world with its supernal sound. But that was only the beginning… The rest of the album can be simply characterized as "pure evil": blasting drums by C. Docre, well-played bass, which is exactly on the songs’ rhythm, fast tempo repetitive guitar riffs that give room for melodic solos from Semjaza 218 and Letifer, excellent vocals from ar-Ra’d al-Iblis and Letifer, varying between growls, low screams, spoken words and whispers. The use of an ecclesiastic choir at the end of “Adharma” further enhances the occultism of the album and overall ‘Sunyata’ offers us a ritualistic, cold and real black sound, touching sometimes the limits of thrash.
The second album with its imaginative artwork is much more aggressive and faster, revealing more hatred and anger than 'Purulence', the band's 2009 debut album. 'Sunyata' has also a ritualistic, almost pagan, atmosphere that the band wants to express through the chosen lyrical themes they're dealing with - Satanism, evil and Greek mythological demons. The sound of the band is much more improved and technically proficient, there is a balance between the vocals and the instruments without overlaps throughout the whole album, while the musical compositions sound much more coherent and concrete.[8]
Sweden's Die Hard are back with their brand of catchy yet aggressive old-school death metal. Fast, thrashing guitars with some really intense and insane riffs and solos put in the mix. Drummer is just as chaotic and all over the place going from the hyper-speed thrashing to a more mid-paced beats but the drumming is very well done and played to perfection. The vocals are a mix of gruff growls and screams - this is definitely a worthwhile purchase for any and all fanatics of old-school thrashing mayhem.
During the last years France has proved that it can be counted among the leading countries in the avant-garde / post-black metal scene - Peste Noire and Blut Aus Nord being only couple of the examples. From now on, France can be also be proud of Decline Of The I.
The band describes its work as something between Burzum, Code and Neurosis, and not unfairly. The band is the idea of the musician A.K. (vocals/ guitars/keyboards/programming/samples), who was previously released various underground metal works, including Malhkebre, Neo Infermo 262, Diapsiquir and Vorkreist.
The concept of the album is based on a trilogy inspired by the works of the biologist Henri Laborit, about aggression in the world and the effort of humans to stand up and fight to this aggression, gaining its freedom. In this process there are three stages: suffering (“Inhibition” – oppressive and heavy), rebelling (“Rebellion” – fast and violent) and finally avoiding (“Escape” – cold and industrial).
'Inhibition' is characterized by its rhythmic sessions, psychedelic noises, spoken French word sessions, female operatic vocals, badass bass that fits to the musical compositions and drums that keep up excellent with the rhythm. The passages from the melodic rhythm guitars to the melancholy riffs, turned to more oppressive sound and reaching a buzzing scratch of the chords, reinforce the depressive, dark and psychedelic atmosphere of the album, that manages in hypnotizing the listener and travel him to a completely ecstatic state of mind. Overall the band stands for the creation of a totally unique sound under the labels ‘post-black metal’ or ‘avant-garde metal’, which may not be captured only from the first hearing.[8]
Enough
brutality to make your head bang like a maniac. This band can be a
bit hard to digest at first, but then as the album progresses you
discover interesting things, good guitar solos, the voice is
shockingly sick and desperate, heavy and interesting riffs along with
brutal drumming. They have the ability to create brutal songs, that's
for sure, this isn't bad, but I guess they need to be more original
in their style, we hear a lot of bands trying so hard to sound like
the old Dismember or Entombed. If you're a fan of old
metal, you'll find plenty to like about this band. Maybe they need
more originality but at the end of the day they kick ass enough to
make it a worthwhile listen. Definitely going to be looking forward
to their next album.
Belgian blasphemers ENTHRONED
are releasing their ninth full-length album, 'Obsidium' this following week and
our contributor Patrick did an interview with
band's vocalist/guitarist Nornagest. This chat
first appeared on Patrick's own Winter Torment Zine and now he has
given me the permission of posting it on my site as well. We're all
in this together, aren't we?
Horns up.
Hails Nornagest, thank you for taking the time to fill out this
interview. Please introduce yourself to the readers who might not be
familiar with you or ENTHRONED.
I am Nornagest vocalist,
lead guitar player and song writer of ENTHRONED. ENTHRONED has been
performing black metal in the pure sense of the word for 20 years now
and we are ready to release our 9th album 'Obsidium' on
Agonia Records on April 10th in the US. (March 20th for
the European version - ED)
When did you all first meet? When did you get the idea to form
ENTHRONED? How would you describe ENTHRONED's music to the readers
who have never heard it?
I met Cernunnos, the first
drummer and founding member in 1992 at a SAMAEL/MORBID ANGEL show in
Antwerp, Belgium. The band was formed in 1993, the goal was to create
a band that would be the catalyst for the belief of its members using
the most powerful kind of sound to carry its energies, and what is
more powerful than extreme metal? ENTHRONED performs black metal,
meaning that our music is the soundtrack for our lyrical concept,
extreme and aggressive yet dark and full of variations, that's how I
could describe it the best IMO.
ENTHRONED has been
going strong in the black metal scene for nearly twenty years! When
you started the band did you ever think you and the band would still
be going this strong? What is it about ENTHRONED and the black metal
scene that has kept you motivated for so long?
Ha! There's
absolutely NOTHING about this scene that kept us doing what we do or
been doing for almost two decades; our honesty towards ourselves
would be more a factor. We never cared about anyone and from day one
we didn't even thought we would have a label knocking to our door to
give us a recording deal. Our thing was to do what we do for
ourselves and if it would reach someone fine , else who cares? But
things went in a very unexpected way, full of surprises and burdens
and in a way made us what we are today as persons, it only gave us
more comfort within our initial idea. ENTHRONED is a part of us as
much as our arms, legs and dicks, so it will always be there as long
as we are alive as it is something we do to first of all please
ourselves, to fulfill some goals we have set for our own and which
would be pretty hard to understand for most.
What is your opinion of the black metal scene today
compared to say 20-25 years ago? Do you feel it has gotten too
commercial? What does 'black metal' mean to you personally? Black
metal is to me satanic/occult message or concept with a metal
background, to me bands such as BLASPHEMY, ROTTING CHRIST, DEATH SS,
MERCYFUL FATE and MAYHEM are all black metal! They are as different
as night and day but in my eyes they're all black metal. This style
is different from others, as it is supposed to be with a strong
personal message behind it linked with the Left Hand Path or Median
Path belief of the persons who are performing it. The main
differences in between the actual scene and the scene as we knew it
20-25 years ago is the accessibility and the flock of pretenders
polluting this 'scene' and creating such a band only due to their
likeness of other bands. But luckily , there is still some bands who
are doing this for the good reasons and not just to show off or
pretend to be something they are not.
The band recently released it's new CD 'Obsidium' through
Agonia Records. How did you come in contact with the label? Are you
happy with them so far? I was in contact with Filip of
Agonia since 1995, he has been a fan since the beginning of the band
and knows our history, releases etc. by heart. He has always been
very supportive even tho we were not signed on his label. After the
demise of Regain Records, we had to start the search for a new record
label and although we had big record companies contacting us and who
were very interested, Agonia gave us the best deal, not necessarily
money wise, not at all, but the rest was far more important, like our
requests, support and most important; he knows ENTHRONED and how the
band is suppose to be, so he never interfered within our decisions,
he respected every single idea, imagery and message the band carries
on, which to me is of the utter most importance. How
long did it take the band to write and record the songs for
'Obsidium'? How has the response been from the fans and the press?
Does the band have any upcoming tours or shows in
support of the album? If yes - where will the band be touring and
playing?
We are working on a south American tour at the
moment and we have some dates planned in the UK, Belgium and Romania.
There might be a fest in Denver, Colorado for the summer. A European
tour is in discussion as well as a North American one.
Over the years I am sure ENTHRONED has shared the stage with
many great legendary and underground cult bands. Who have been some
of your favorite bands to tour with? If you could set-up a 'dream'
show/tour who would you love to tour with?
There are a few
bands that we both musically and personally enjoyed to share stages
with, the best moments were probably with bands like GORGOROTH (the
real GORGOROTH that is), DESTROYER 666, USURPER, EMPEROR, SHINING,
SADUS, ROTTING CHRIST, HELL MILITIA and ANTAEUS. Maybe doing some
kind of festival tour with those same bands would be just utopia,
especially on the personal, human point of view. You
play the guitars and perform the vocals duties in the band, at what
age did you start playing guitars? Are you self-taught or did you
take lessons in the beginning?
I started playing at the
age of 13 and before that my first instrument was bass guitar. I am
completely self-taught, to be honest I do not even know partitions,
solfège or any pedagogical solmization, I just let my feelings flow
or being puked through my guitar, this is the best way to express
yourself I think. Who are some of your
influences/favorite guitarist? Do you play other instruments?
My influences are pretty vast; my first years as a guitar
player were bath by the influences of guitar players such as Kerry
King, Axel Rudi Pell, Jimmy Hendrix, Quorthon, Jeff Waters and Adrian
Smith amongst others. But the principal thing is that I always
tried to do my own thing, which gave me hours of headache and serious
nervous breakdown to be honest, but it was very rewarding. I also
play bass, piano, keyboards, sistrum and the tubular bell.
Nornagest
You are also the vocalist for the band, when did you first
become interested in singing? who are some of your favorite singers?
Before I joined ENTHRONED, I was the vocalist of every band I
was involved with, so when our previous vocalist was removed from the
line-up, the other members wanted me to take over the vocals. For
them it was only logical as I write all the lyrics and they loved my
vocals, but then I really did not want to do that mainly due to the
fact that I appreciated my position as lead guitarist and I didn't
want to be the center of attention on stage, but well, when Phorgath
was asked to join on bass he told me that the he would gladly accept
at the condition that I would do the vocals, so I gave it a shot and
after a while got use to it and actually appreciate the fact that I
could give my lyrics the correct and right feeling into them. As for
my favorite vocalists, few would be BM ones but Ihsahn (EMPEROR) and
Attila (MAYHEM, SUNN O))), TORMENTOR) would be my stand outs. Else I
really appreciate Nick Cave, Sivert Høyem (MADRUGADA), Lou Reed
(VELVET UNDERGROUND era), Bruce Dickinson and Arno (Belgian artist)
among others. Do you do anything special to keep your
throat/voice healthy when recording a release or on tour?
Yes,
smoke and drink booze! Sometimes I just have to make a break of
course, you can't just keep doing this on tour, but I've noticed that
if I completely stopped smoking on tour it just got worse, just had
to keep on smoking but in a 'reasonable' way.
Which usually comes first, the music or the lyrics of the song?
What are some topics/subjects you all write about?
It
depends really, for the previous album 'Pentagrammaton',
the lyrics were written first and the whole work was to literally
translate those lyrics into music, which is a titanic work. Else, it
really depends of the song, but one side always influences the other,
for example; If the music is written first, I'll write lyrics that
matches, represent the emotions involved within the music and
likewise is the lyrics are written first.
Our topics are always dealing with Satanism/Occultism in the pure
sense of the word, no BM Satanism or gimmicks, we are dealing with
what really lies behind the veil. On the three last albums, the
concept is identical, each album is a follow up to the previous one,
like three different volumes following the same concept and ideals.
'Tetra Karcist' is dealing with the reality of
occultism how it is, without any gimmick nor supposition, how things
are within the occult. 'Pentagrammaton' retrace
experiences, real lived experiences through those doctrines and
practices we talked about on 'Tetra Karcist',
now with 'Obsidium' the concept deals with what
we learned, the achievement we reached in one form or another through
those experiences, all written in a way that only people who are
actually within the occult circle can understand fully.
Well
Nornagest, we have reached the end of interview. Do you have anything
you would like to add before we end the interview?
Thanx
for the interview and be sure to get our 9th album 'Obsidium'!
