Tag Archives: Lorraine Lysen

Graveworm – Ascending Hate

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With Ascending Hate (AFM) the Italian Symphonic Black Metal band Graveworm presents their ninth studio album – a beastie that has been three and a half years in the making, but well worth the wait!

One of my favourite elements on this album is the piano which is overlaid on the music, for instance in ‘Downfall of Heaven’ or ‘Rise Again’; the contradiction between the black metal and the more sensitive piano really adds depth to the compositions. Another contradiction that really made me happy was that between the music and the lyrics in songs like ‘Blood Torture Death’ as never before have lyrics like those been sung of such a cheerful melody.

The opening track, ‘The Death Heritage’, is one of the highlights on this album, and sets the bar really high. It has a nice acoustic intro on classical guitar, which is then penetrated by heavy, electric distorted guitar before the metal ensues, with blast-beats and grunts, and you can really appreciate the skills that went into the composition. The guitars add melodies that support the growls, and the synth-heavy breaks are also very tasteful and mysterious.

‘To The Empire of Madness’ has very good drumming, and a lovely acoustic break which is interspersed with more metal. The guitar riffs are once again excellent and the grunts, like the rest of the song, are very dynamic, meaning that it holds the attention from start to finish. The acoustic outro is one of the many points on the album where you really get to admire the skill and tastefulness of guitarists Eric Righi and Stefan Unterpertinger.

‘Stillborn’ features yet more incredible instrumentation from all musicians, with a slower pace but is very intense. ‘Liars to the Lions’, on the other hand, is very fast, but it also contains those intense melancholic sections that Graveworm excels at, while despite the clear and polished sound, ‘Sons of Lies’ has a lovely gritty atmosphere. The switch that Stefano Fiori makes between his low and high grunts is one of the reasons I really enjoyed this track.

The closing number of the album is ‘Nocturnal Hymns Part II’. The first Nocturnal Hymns featured on the 1999 As Angels Reach the Beauty album (Serenades), and this new version uses the old motifs to create a more modern and heavy song. It is once again very dynamic, and the guitar riffs halfway through really build a lot of tension. I think this is a very strong finish to what is a very strong album, and it is great to have older work reprised this way.

 

8.0/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN


The Meads of Asphodel / Tjolgtjar – Taste of Divine Wrath

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The Meads of Asphodel are no strangers to split LPs, nor is Tjolgtjar for that matter, but this is the first time the pair team up for a co-creation. The result is Taste of Divine Wrath (Eternal Death).

The Meads of Asphodel has one of the best song titles I have seen in a while: ‘An Ebullient Prelude to a Loathsomely Grim End’. This short intro has a high level of bombast and the promised ebullience with its orchestra and choir, and gives way to the sufficiently grim ‘Chidiock Tichborne’. This song is very high paced and strange. The lyrics “High treason, hung, drawn, and quartered,” really impart the loathsomely grim end that was referred to in the previous title. The grunts are slow when compared to the music, and this contrast, together with the variation in styles of grunt, makes the song interesting.

Then follows an utterly bewildering cover of ‘You Got the Love’, called ‘You’ve Got the Hate’. It is mystifying and confusing, but actually quite good.

The penultimate song on the A-side is about Balthasar Gérard, the infamous murderer of William I of Orange who was gruesomely executed for his deed. This song details the execution and questions the value of the assassination. The music is rather atmospheric and beautiful, with acoustic guitars and synths, and contrasts rather poignantly with the subject of the lyrics. The atmospheric style continues into the final song ‘Infidel’, but this also contains some of the musical brutality of ‘Chidiock Tickborne’.

The B side of the split is Tjolgtjar, a one-man project in a genre known as “Black’n’Roll.” The first song, entitled ‘The 5th Mass & Her Works’ is a bit of a cut and paste of a mind-boggling mixture of Psychedelic oriented Rock’n’Roll with sections of Black noise. The next song, ‘Near You Always’, is far more balanced, having mostly a base of Psychedelica with a topping of Black rather than the rapidly altering sections of the previous song. I was rather pleased with the sounds of an actual goat in ‘A Goat in the Woods’, which is an instrumental song firmly entrenched in Psychedelic territory. The main guitar riff for ‘Winter Research’ is brilliant and catchy. The voice-overs at the start, middle, and end of this side make this a strange collection, however, the alien manifesto and satanic cults do make for very interesting listening.

With songs well put together; if you are interested in the strange and experimental sides of black metal, this split album might just broaden your horizons.

 

7.5/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN


Sirenia – The Seventh Life Path

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On The Seventh Life Path (Napalm), their seventh studio album, Norwegians Sirenia pull out all the stops to set themselves apart from others in the Symphonic Metal field. It’s refreshing to hear pure synth sounds, as in the intro to ‘Once My Light’, rather than merely a synth-orchestra, though the orchestra is in full force throughout and delivers all the bombast that Symphonic Metal fans could hope for. And from the very first song on the album it is already clear that the choir arrangements are equally dramatic as the orchestrals, with ‘Elixir’ featuring some particularly remarkable choral work.

There is a very pleasant contradiction between the low male vocals and high female lines. This contrast is even stronger because it is generally followed by grunts. Other great choir parts can be found in ‘Insania’, again contrasting with the grunts of Morten Veland, and in ‘Sons of the North’ where the male choral intro is quite unlike any of the other lines on this album. Unfortunately this song had a weird little thing going on with the drums in the verse that made it appear as if the song was skipping. This, however, was soon forgotten owing to the overall quality of the music, especially the disturbing piano solo.

Besides the choir, vocals are provided by Ailyn, who has the soft and sweet voice that is common in this particular genre, although she does sometimes hint at a more powerful voice. Some of the backing vocals on the beautiful ‘Tragedienne’ have a ballsiness to them that I really would love to hear in the main lines. As it is now, I am glad to have the grunts and choirs alongside the softer singing. There is one major exception though: ‘Contemptuous Quietus’ has a very deep classical sound very much like the voice of Simone Simons of Epica. This power really suits the music very well.

This album has a great amount of bombast on a bed of surprisingly heavy metal guitar, drums, and bass, with a layer of catchy licks and synths and a variety of vocals. It has a distinct character that will definitely appeal to fans of symphonic metal.

 

7.5/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN


Galley Beggar – Silence and Tears

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Galley Beggar is an English Folk Rock band who combines traditional songs with a modern Psychedelic sound. This sextet proves that the genre of Folk is still very much alive and kicking, and thrives on musical innovations.

As the title suggests, Silence and Tears (Rise Above) is quite a melancholic album. While this is generally not an issue, I did find the lyrics in ‘Adam and Eve’ to be a bit off-putting… I guess a bitter and judgemental Adam complaining to God how everything was Eve’s fault isn’t really my style. Musically, however, this is an excellent song which shows off the beautiful combinations of acoustic guitar, bass and violin, as well as the dominant female vocals. Another song where the vocals are really powerful is ‘Empty Sky’. The contrast with mellow violins and the excellent bass lines makes the song very dynamic.

The vocals on ‘Pay my Body Home’ are also really good: they are not so much main and backing vocals as dual leads, with another line on guitar. The guitars sound very distant, and the overall vibe of the song is very mellow. However, the best vocal combinations on this album are in ‘Deliver Him’, where the arrangements are almost overwhelmingly beautiful.

The guitars on ‘Sanctuary Song’ are dance effectively, and it is certainly my favourite song of the album. While it still has a touch of that melancholy that infuses this album, the lines of the guitars also have the sound of hope and a hint of cheerfulness.

Galley Beggar is helping folk music evolve and Silence and Tears may well be a crucial step in that evolution. It certainly is a very interesting one.

 

7.5/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN


Roadburn Festival Re-Revisited: Unsung Performances

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Besides all the amazing headlining acts at this year’s Roadburn Festival, there are also so many bands in the smaller venues that it would be remiss of me not to mention some of my favourites. Scott H Biram was the first of these, shaking up the Stage01 with music a mixture of amazing Blues, Punk, and Heavy Metal, in a one-man and mostly acoustic format. With an instrumentarium of four battered Gibsons and an electric plank, Biram kept the audience entertained with stories and anecdotes and his wonderfully collection of songs. On Friday Einar Selvik gave a presentation about the origin of and ideas behind Wardruna, as well as the way he approaches making the music. He also demonstrated a number of the instruments he uses. The presentation was at the same time informative and endearing, and knowing how much effort goes into the music makes it sound even better.

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Possibly my favourite show of the entire festival was Pekko Käppi & K:H:H:L. Playing the Jouhikko (bowed lyre) and electric cigar boxes, this eclectic trio makes some astounding Finnish-language blues music. Pekko explained all the sing titles and subjects to us: “This is a song about a woman accused of witchcraft and burned at the stake. It is a happy song!” The live rendition of ‘Anna Orjan Ulvoa Kuuta (Let Your Slave Bark at the Moon)’ was certainly the most spectacular blues performance I have ever seen. Another show I really enjoyed was the Experimental Black metal by the Belgian act Briqueville. They played the entire shows in black hooded robes and golden plague masks, which gave an atmosphere as if you were present at a ritual of a dark cult, especially when the black robes were backlit by red light. The music is dark and moody, very melodic, and the sound is very well balanced and satisfying. They only have an EP out so far, but if they keep up this level of work in their upcoming album I think they can go far.

 

WORDS BY LORRAINE LYSEN

 


Elderoth – Mystic

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Mystic (Elderoth Entertainment Inc.) is the second album by Canadian Prog project Elderoth. While there is a live line-up, the album is entirely written, played, and produced by Collin McGee. He aims to mix exotic instruments with the Western progressive style.

From the first notes to the last, this music is very in-your-face. There is usually a scale being played by some instrument somewhere, possibly by several at once. At the start this seems like a minor quirk, but as the album progressed I found myself becoming more and more agitated. There is too much of everything.

‘This Shadow By My Side’ has a very busy intro, which sounds all right, and then a total change to the rest of the music. The change at 2:10 is really well done, but a mere 20 seconds later there is another ill-fitting change. Changes in prog are cool, but make them fit the music, rather than just stopping and starting at random every so many bars.

‘My Future’ has a really strange, almost disco-like feel at the start that is weird but not entirely unpleasant. The vocals aren’t necessarily bad, but they often sound constricted. He needs to sing more towards the end to the sentence so that the final word doesn’t just fall into an abyss of mumbling. This song has a very nice symphonic interlude that is really well balanced and is probably my favourite section on the album.

And then there’s ‘Falling Star’. Musically this is far from the worst song on the album, although it would definitely have been better off without the synths in the intro, but this song does feature some of the worst lyrics I have heard all year. Note to any songwriters: if your chorus sounds like you took your rhyme from ‘Twinkle Twinkle’, you’re doing something wrong. It was the most cringeworthy part of the album and I had to skip the rest of the song at some point.

There are a lot of really good elements and that for me is where the problem lies. There are too many different things going on at once for me to be at all comfortable listening to this, and there are too many changes that don’t work well. Perhaps it is less jarring for those who do not suffer from hypersensitivity disorder. I really hope Collin McGee learns the benefits of silence and calm, because I think he could do so much better than this. He has proven that he can write interesting lines with interesting instruments, now he just needs to not use all of them at once.

 

5.0/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN


Crom Dubh – Heimweh

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Since their previous album, Omnia Mutantur (self-released), was a collection of their demos and EP, Heimweh (Ván Records) is technically the first full-length album by Black Metal band Crom Dubh. This London-based quartet has been writing Viking-themed music since 2003, and show their experience and skill on this album.

Upon seeing the track list I was immediately intrigued by not one but two two-part songs; namely ‘Cutting Teeth’ and ‘Kings’. In both cases the first part is a short instrumental piece that serves as a gentler introduction to the heavy second part. The guitar lines on ‘Cutting Teeth’ have enough variation to keep things interesting, and the blastbeats are on point. The grunts are also quite varied and sometimes the vocal lines combines with the guitars have a little of that folk-metal vibe. That folky feel comes back at several points later on the album but most clearly in the guitar lines in ‘Sedition’.

In ‘Kings I’ the band shows that they are capable of great subtlety, with not only a gentle but dark melody coming through on one side, but also a corresponding echo on the other. I would have liked the intro to have a bit more of a build up to the main event, but because ‘Kings II’ continues in the same chord it at least sounds like it belongs together. ‘Kings II’ shows a much greater amount of variation than the previous songs, and it really works rather well. The sound is still dark, but the alternating melodies of the guitars open the piece up and make it really enjoyable and captivating to listen to.

All in all, this is a very interesting Black Metal album with some hints of folk. I want to mention that the drumming is absolutely phenomenal and carries the music very well. The rhythms are always effective and interesting, and the fills spice things up nicely. Just listen to ‘The Invulnerable Tide’ and you’ll understand what I mean.

A thoroughly enjoyable listen, and the band can take great pride in having this as their first full album.

 

8.5/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN


Falconer – Falconer (Ultimate Edition)

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Because they are going to stop performing live, Folk Metal pioneers Falconer have decided to re-release their 2001 debut album Falconer, and now present us with the Falconer (Ultimate Edition) (Metal Blade). The tracks have all been remastered, and the bonus CD contains previously unreleased acoustic versions of some of their best songs as well as some of the original demos. If you’re already a fan of Falconer, this is a really good way to complete your collection.

For those of you not yet familiar with Falconer and their oeuvre, here follows a review of this album.

Falconer hails from an era when the Folk in Folk-metal was not so in-your-face Pagan as it is now. Their sound is generally that of Power Metal, but it feels more grounded than cheesy and over the top. However, many of the riffs, like those in the verses of ‘Wings of Serenity’ wouldn’t be misplaced in the modern Pagan Metal sound. The lyrics and themes in songs as ‘Lord of the Blacksmiths’ and ‘The Past Still Lives On’ also indicate their folk-metal status, in the latter case further emphasised in the acoustic guitar line. Then there are songs that are fully recognisable as Folk Metal, such as ‘A Quest for the Crown’. And then there is ‘Per Tyrssons döttrar i Vänge’, which is originally a medieval Swedish ballad. It cannot get much more Folk Metal than that.

As for the bonus material, the acoustic renditions of ‘Royal Galley’, ‘Wings of Serenity’, and ‘Mindtraveller’ are really well done and intense in their minimalism. They actually surpass the original songs. Mathias Blad proves again how good he is, as he has done throughout the album proper. He has a beautiful clear voice which is perfectly suited to the flowing melodies of this music.

While the demos on the bonus CD are most relevant to fans of Falconer, the quality of the music on the rest of this album means that it is much more than simply a collectible. This is an excellent album for anyone who likes both Folk and Power Metal.

 

8.5/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN


Wilderun – Sleep at the Edge of the Earth

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Sleep at the Edge of the Earth (self-released) is the second album by Wilderun, a Folk Metal band from Boston, Massachusetts. They aim to not only play Folk Metal that can hold its own against the great European bands, but that also incorporates some of the American Folk traditions.

The opening number, ‘Dust and Crooked Thoughts’ immediately brings about that folky feel with acoustic guitars and running water, and is a very serene opening to the album, mirrored by the beautiful ‘Sleep at the Edge of the Earth’ that closes the album. Following on the introduction come the bulkiest bit of this album: the tetralogy of ‘Ash Memory’. These four songs are connected but all have their own distinct feel. ‘And So Opens the Earth’ is very bombastic, while ‘Hope and Shadow’ is very peaceful and gentle. ‘Bite the Wound’ is out and out Metal, while ‘The Faintest Echo’ has a very dark sound. Besides this wildly varying but effective tetralogy, I especially like ‘The Garden of Fire’, which is a very heavy song and has really interesting melodies and lines that really caught my attention.

Sometimes when a band tries to merge all their favourite styles of music together they end up falling on their face, but not so with Wilderun. For me the key word of this album is balance. They highlight an acoustic guitar in the midst of an onslaught of metal, and add all the heavy edges to an atmospheric folk section. The different vocals styles – regular vocals, chant-like vocals, and grunts – are always in perfect harmony with the music they feature in, and that’s exactly the way I like it. In fact, I frequently found myself grinning with joy at a particularly good riff or vocal line, because this album is a lot of fun.

 

8.0/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN


Obsolete – Riven

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Obsolete is a Dark Progressive band from Ohio, and Riven (self-released) is their second EP. It has four songs, the last of which was released in a slightly different form on their previous EP, Ockham’s Razor (also self-released).

While the balance of the instruments is quite good, the vocals aren’t so much mixed in as put on top of the music. While I like the clean and full sound of Dan Rivera’s voice, it doesn’t work very well when he sings high and fast, which he does in ‘Grey’ and ‘Seven Years’. I think this has to do with the vibrato, which makes it sound like he’s uncontrolled and a little out of tune at the end of short notes, as well as a certain nasal quality that sometimes seeps into his voice. A longer sustained note at the end of his lines might alleviate both this and the sense of abrupt ending. The vocals do sound much better when they are slower, such as at the end of ‘From the Beginning’ and ‘Barren’.

I enjoyed the bass lines, especially on ‘Grey’, and the drumming is solid and tight. Both the electric and acoustic guitars generally sound good. However, ‘From the Beginning’ varies between different styles in a disjointed way, and even in the intro when the band comes in it is just not tight enough to be entirely comfortable. I did enjoy ‘Barren’, as the transitions between soft and hard are good and the backing vocals work well.

While there are definitely a lot of good elements on this EP, there are also a few glaring mistakes that should the band should have picked up on when listening to the recorded product, as there are a few notes in every song that could have done with a re-take. All in all, it sounds like the band rushed to produce an EP instead of taking the time to unlock their full potential.

 

4.5/10

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LORRAINE LYSEN