74th part of short reviews.
NOCTURNAL – Serpent Death
Year of release: 2021
Label: Dying Victims Productions
Rating: 7 / 10
There are two cool Thrash Metal bands in Germany that are very similar to each other in a good way and bad way. NOCTURNAL and DESASTER play great old-fashioned thrash metal, bring the proper old-school aesthetics to the masses, but for the life of me - their music is too melodic. NOCTURNAL nevertheless took the lead in this conditional competition - if DESASTER signed up to Metal Blade and went through the sterilization procedure, then the new NOCTURNAL album was released on Dying Victims, one of the best thrash labels of our time. So NOCTURNAL sounds dirty, crooked, but again very melodic. Aside from melodiousness, this is good thrash metal with crazy dynamics, where guitars chop meat at speeds close to DEATHHAMMER. The main guitarist of the band is the creator of FRONT BEAST, and this is another reason to pay some attention to this release.
SKOGNATT – Rain Eternal
Year of release: 2021
Label: self-release
Rating: 6,8 / 10
Unpretentious melancholic metal, painted in a radical gray color. The compositions develop strictly in a straight line, relying on stable percussive rhythms. Periodically, you can hear some beautiful acoustic interludes. The sound could have been better, but for a solo project, it's quite good. Everything is organic. I recommend it to the fans of WIGRID, EKOVE EFRITS, DUNKEL, FORGOTTEN WOODS.
IDLE RUIN – Idle Ruin
Year of release: 2021
Label: self-release
Rating: 6,5 / 10
Thrash death metal from Australia. Almost Swedish heaviness is combined with a very aggressive performance, but in a thrashy style; if you imagined something like CUT UP, you missed. It should sound killer live, but it's difficult to draw conclusions from the recording. I still don't get the impression that the musicians started this project in earnest, and not just for fun. However, in some places it is very fucking good.
MEILLÄ OLI VAIN YÖ – Mustan metallin muistelot
Year of release: 2019
Label: self-release
Rating: 6,6 / 10
An anonymous project from Finland, continuing the work of Ulver's "Nattens Madrigal". From the first seconds, it covers the eardrums with multiple cuts with the help of a monstrous guitar sound, which is commonly referred to by the shit-eaters on the Internet as “recording on a dictaphone”. I must say that the Finn even managed to surpass ULVER - after listening to one song, I started hearing whistling in my ears, and I'm not kidding. At the same time, the album is strangely simpler for perception, since this sound is easily decomposed into elements. The guitar melodies are really good, there seems to be no bass at all, the percussion is fixed on a constant blast beat, the vocals grumble a little behind. Challenge yourself.
DEATH REVELATION – Apokatastasis
Year of release: 2020
Label: self-release
Rating: 7 / 10
There are more and more anonymous projects from Belarus, and this anonymous project is undoubtedly the brainchild of the authors of another anonymous project, NIAISNY, because the similarity in sound is too noticeable. So far, DEATH REVELATION's discography consists of this digital EP. I would describe the sound with the word "vortex", since the guitar parts here resemble gusts of wind, whipping your face from different directions non-stop. The melodics and vocals are characterized by a certain unhealthy emotionality, but I don't even know what this emotion is called. Something similar can be heard in DEATHSPELL OMEGA's melodic fragments. Probably, the French had a certain influence on DEATH REVELATION, since in the middle of the second track there is an atonal segment that seems to be played with broken fingers. All in all - a very promising EP, and it's a shame that this kind of music vegetates in an atmosphere of deep secrecy, even if it is the choice of the authors themselves.
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