Year: 2024
Label: Handful of Hate
Rating: 7,4 / 10
The reissue of the Belarusian band's debut album, which was previously released only digitally and in microscopic print run on cassettes by the label Out of Kurgan. At the moment, the guys are working on new releases with the help of "Jama" and everyone who dwells there, but in 2024, they were totally independent, so the album is quite different from what you can hear on splits with PESTILENTIA and ACWEALD.
"Klokatam krumkacha..." quickly makes it clear that FAUSTBRUHIEL admired primarily the Belarusian and Teutonic scenes, as well as bands close to the right-wing scene and inspired by the same Germans or French. The intense melody and even a certain epic sound are reminiscent of 2000s ABSURD, but there is no characteristic "robbery" dash and malicious cheerfulness. Instead, FAUSTBRUHIEL's music is enveloped in a well-known Krywian melancholy in the style of, for example, ZAKLON (there are even clean-voiced declamations here). Actually, it is really interesting to study “Klokatam krumkača...” as a constructor, trying to remember where you've already heard this or that fragment. The band drew inspiration from many different sources, so the album turned out to be very diverse. Individually, literally everything here is taken from someone else's arsenal, but FAUSTBRUHIEL managed to keep the music in the same style and mood, thus making something of their own.
It is noteworthy that in their approach to their compositions, FAUSTBRUHIEL used primarily a sense of melody, rather than the standard bridge of “squares" that the vast majority of metal bands choose. Songs often take unpredictable paths and try to avoid typical structures. Guitars work boldly and openly. The songs may sound in one way at the beginning and in entirely different way by the end. And even if not everything turns out perfectly, the ambition is always a plus.
Unfortunately, the recording quality does not fully match the level of ambition. It turned out very well for amateur work, but a lot of things could have been improved in guitars, drums, keyboards, and especially vocals. The main voice lacks dynamics, is slightly muffled, and even slightly lisping. Pure-voiced recitations generally seem to come from under the pillow. The demo "Medieval Misanthropic Forest" has been added to the disc, where everything is even worse, but it's a demo after all. In fact, if “Klokatam krumkacha...” was re-recorded with high-quality studio sound and a smoother performance, such an album would be a real gift for a German label like Purity Through Fire, because this is 100% his style of music. But PTF will continue to produce homogeneous plastic Teutonic boredom, because he listens to this bullshit rather than to interesting Belarusians.
The CD edition of the album from Handful of Hate has a strict booklet with all the texts typed in classical Belarusian Latin, and a new cover, which is many times better than the funny original with a boar, a bear and a bison. However, this cover doesn't match the musical material much either, but it was the band's choice. Details on a video.
