TRILLION RED: "Two Tongues"

Huh, Trillion Red’s debut EP Two Tongues takes by surprise. With practically no expectations or ideas what it would sound like, this duo provides some very dark music that isn’t so easy to categorize, but I guess we could go with something like ambient, doom, black, prog and Mastodon influenced rock / metal, partially bringing to my mind the recently reviewed Dead Neon as well.

The four songs on Two Tongues are all quite intriguing individual pieces, so there’s certainly no shortage of adventurous music. At times it crushes with sheer power, sometimes confuses with unusual beats and mood shifts, and sometimes touches with latent melancholy - or all this together at the same time. And what best, it never sounds pretentious, but natural and emotional. The soundscape is massive as well, as there’s a plethora of different sounds to be found from the mix.

I am fond of the vocals as well which are mostly clean and ’unprofessional’ wailings, shouts and scream, it’s not the easiest style to depict, but once again you could think of Mastodon and you’re about on the right track. Is there anything negative to say about Two Tongues, then?  Not really anything negative, but of course not every second of the music is THAT good that it would deserve five stars, but I can’t go wrong with four stars at least. An innovative piece of art that is recommendable if you’re up for some avant-garde and experimental touch in your rock and metal.

4 / 5

BLOODTHIRST: "Żądza Krwi"

Bloodthirst has been churning out new releases - albeit mostly splits or similar ’minor’ outputs - for a decade already, but Żądza Krwi is my first exposure to the band. But who could have heard all these gazillion thrash/black metal bands, anyway? Better later than never, even if I’m not sure would I have missed much if I had not heard Żądza Krwi, a quite traditional blackened thrash metal EP.

The ingredients are simple: take the drum beats, guitar solos and overall attitude of thrash metal and mix it with menacing tremolo guitars, high-pitched screams and general harshness of black metal and there you have Żądza Krwi and its four tracks clocking at fifteen minutes at total, a fitting time for a musical experience so familiar already. And while a good release does not require originality, there’s not enough hooks on the EP to trigger my interest entirely. Bloodthirst plays well and is convincingly evil and rapid, but real masterpiece compositions are evidently missing.

An interesting feature are the vocals sung in Polish for the first time - apparently - in Bloodthirst’s history. I’d consider this as a definite plus, as the harsh sounding language adds to the atmosphere probably much better than the so often heard and harmless English. Production-wise, Żądza Krwi is quite bright but luckily with mandatory rawness. Composition-wise, as said, there’s not much to find from the EP, but the most hardcore followers of the Polish scene might want to look into the record, a record of solidly played black / thrash that does kick ass but also could have provided much more.

2.5 / 5

MORTUALIA: "Mortualia"

Albeit mostly known for his main projects Horna and Sargeist, Shatraug has a ton of various side projects. Of all those, Mortualia is the one focusing on desolate atmosphere, torturing repetition, dragging tempo, the vision of a hopeless future: in other words, depressive black metal. The self-titled debut was originally released back in 2007 but it is now getting a re-release treatment by Moribund Cult, though I am basing my review on the original Northern Sky Productions version of which I’ve possessed a copy for a couple of years already.

Mortualia doesn’t fall to the most common problems of depressive black metal. Whereas many contenders turn out to sound just pitiful in their angst, this album does not dwell in self-pity at all. This is cold, distant, murky, and with a great dose malicious melodies and riffs without any clichéd over-melodic tunes. The first monster, ”The Blue Silence” clocking at seventeen minutes, is probably the most melancholic piece of the bunch, followed by another similar track ”In Bleak Loneliness”, after which ”Cold and Grey” kicks in with murky menace: gone are the wistful sounds of the first tracks. The minimal ”Devoid of Warmth” is a strong addition to the whole, but pales in comparison to the last piece, ”Forgotten Soul”, of which beginning riff is so damn dramatic that it truly chills.

To elaborate the album’s sound further, you can probably already guess that Mortualia isn’t professionally produced, and that is only good. Both drums and guitars are quite remote sounding but without any unnecessary amounts of reverb. Shatraug’s vocals are very, very high-pitched and semi-clean wailings which might turn off some and, to be honest, I wasn’t very keen on them at first, but they’ve grown on me over the years. I still prefer his sound on the next full-length Blood of the Hermit on which he gets raspier, though.

If you’re looking for a proper and authentic piece of depressive black metal, I would recommend Mortualia. Perhaps it is not a cornerstone album of the subgenre, but a worthy addition to anyone’s collection who claims to be a fan of the style, as the ringing coldness and joy-killing desolation is surely to make an impact. In case the vocals are too much to bear, then look into Blood of the Hermit, and even that glitch has been then fixed.

4 / 5

ABRASIVE: "The Birth... Born in Sodom"

Amidst the myriad of old school death metal bands hailing the Swedish scene, Abrasive’s fourth full-length The Birth... Born in Sodom is refreshing to hear, even though it’s ultimately and strictly old school. But instead of the chainsaw guitars and graveyard stenches, here we’ve got an extremely muddy, confusing and dirty piece of death metal in the vein of Effigy of the Forgotten by Suffocation.

Deep grunts, downtuned guitar menace with occasional violent screeches, primitive drum sound (just listen to that snare!), not-that-careful execution of instruments, hysterical atmosphere... The list of successful features seems to see no end. Of course, The Birth... Born in Sodom isn’t really anything out of the ordinary, pretty much the opposite, but when a good sound production (some could disagree about that, considering it’s quite lo-fi) gets mixed with compositions that have just enough catchiness, yours truly is impressed in spite of all unoriginality.

The ’sexual perversions’ theme surrounding the album and the band in general might not be my cup of tea, but it’s not like you could decipher the lyrics anyway and, most importantly, the band doesn’t sound like a vapid porngrind group. They know what they’re doing here, assaulting with grand blasphemy from the beginning to the very end. The Birth... Born in Sodom is not to disappoint those who enjoy the band mentioned in the first paragraph, as long as you’re not expecting anything innovative.

3.5 / 5

HARM: "Demonic Alliance"

On their second major offering Demonic Alliance, Harm blasts quite common modern thrash metal, though with evident flirts with death metal, as at times the album rumbles like a Gojira record. But the main focus is on the rather fast thrash beats and power chord riffs, and these both mixed with a touch of semi-technicality (these aren’t that simple, nor old school, compositions) and a clear and tight production.

The only, though quite crucial, glitch of the album is its predictability throughout the 36 minutes: occasional lead melodies and solos do not count as anything really peculiar. So while I appreciate the tight and fast execution of instruments (which is probably the biggest plus in this album, these guys play damn nicely), there’s not enough interesting variation between the nine tracks of solidly executed metal. This is, however, just my personal opinion, as an album like Demonic Alliance isn’t the kind of music I usually listen to anyways, so it is to be kept in mind that these comments are coming from a person who would always prefer a little more devilish, old school and dirty sound in his thrash metal, something like Gräfenstein, for example.

Demonic Alliance’s aftertaste is decent. I’ve heard worse efforts in modern thrash, but also a slew of more convincing ones. The bonus DVD includes a video for ”Demon” and a bunch of more and less interesting extra footage that only a devoted Harm fan can truly enjoy to follow.  Demonic Alliance might not have been made for these ears, but it will reach and please the fans of the style.

2.5 / 5

FIDEI DEFENSOR: "Cognoscenti"

After the unsuccessful campaign initiated by the label Supernal Music that was originally going to release the album (with the little ’if’ that the album would have to sell out the whole run of 250 copies in preorders), Darker Than Black Records has taken care of Fidei Defensor’s debut album’s release since the preorder project failed and Supernal Music backed out.

My first thoughts after reading about the album was that it would be a feast on raw, uncompromising black metal occultism, but that is quite far from the truth; despite the overall harshness revolving around the album, Cognoscenti is more prominently beautiful, giving much emphasis to melancholic melody. Considering the first track ”Nvlli Expvgnabilis Hosti” and the beginning of the next one ”Veritas, Satana”, the album sounds like a delicate post-rock affair with all those reverby, fragile guitar pickings. It is not until the first five minutes or so are over when the distortion and metal kicks in, guitars fluctuating between wistful and ominous riffs and melodies, vocals having perhaps an unnecessary amount of effected distortion on them, and drums being programmed, though they sound decent enough.

From there on, throughout the next three last tracks, Cognoscenti continues balancing between quieter moments (”Pallida Mors” even having a nice piano outro) and mid-tempo black metal sections. I don’t think the compositions stand out with absolute uniqueness, but the band does seem to know what they’re doing at creating a strong whole of black metal that nicely varies between calmful and fierce parts. The running time isn’t prolonged either, clocking at 32 minutes, which is another thing for the album’s good. Cognoscenti might not be the most impressive black metal release of the year, but delivers its music convincingly enough to deserve an occasional spin from me.

3 / 5

OPRICH: "North the Boundless"

Exclusive folk metal has never really been my thing, it has always required at least a vague flavour of black metal to trigger my interest to any extent but, admittedly, there are some Eastern European acts that know how to do it right. Oprich’s North the Boundless is close to that, in that it combines aggressiveness with catchy compositions, not to forget the melancholic parts that I always tend to love the most on folk metal albums.

When I say catchy, do not expect any too simple pop song progressions here. What I mean is that on North the Boundless the sharp electric guitar sound brings the best out off the vivid guitar lines common in folk metal. In addition to the guitars, various traditional instruments are prominently incorporated into the music, often delivering the lead melodies. The drum sound is quite bright as well, and in fact the whole album is a rather polished affair that might not be for those who require some filthiness from their metal. The most I’m impressed of the masculine vocal output, both clean and growled, which is almost a necessity on an authentic folk metal piece.

For musical comparisons, Temnozor is easy to mention here, and as a fan of that band, one can guess that I indeed enjoy North the Boundless. It might not contain as epic songs as the aforementioned band inclines to feature on every album, but Oprich is probably deliberately focusing on the upbeat metal tracks, and the melancholic elements are only an occasional spice in the mix. As for individual tracks, I see no reason to mention any specific highlights as the quality remains intact throughout without any clearly weaker tracks.

North the Boundless isn’t the first nor last folk metal offering in this certain Eastern European fashion, and at what it does, it does it well. I would most likely choose a Temnozor album over this one any day, but North the Boundless is nonetheless a worthy investment for those fond of how folk metal is usually handled over at Russia and its neighbour countries. A three star rating is fully deserved in this case.

3 / 5