Archive for May, 2020

Album of the Week 22-2020: Othyrworld – Beyond Into The Night Of Day


Othyrworld was the continuation of Canadian sci-fi heavy metal band Sacred Blade. Don’t believe me? Their first – and unfortunately only – album ‘Beyond Into The Night Of Day’ contains nine tracks that could also be found on Sacred Blade’s 1986 debut album ‘Of The Sun + Moon’. While that may render the release pointless to some, that album was actually quite ambitious for its time and I’m not sure if the available technology was able to fulfill main man Jeff Ulmer’s vision at the time. Ulmer definitely took control of ‘Beyond Into The Night Of Day’, as he is only helped by drummer Ted Zawadski.

Musically, Sacred Blade and Othyrworld were pretty much on the more progressive end of the US power metal scale, despite not actually being American. Comparisons to Crimson Glory are often made due to the song structures and sci-fi themes, but those comparisons may also be a tad misleading. Jeff Ulmer’s voice is significantly lower than Midnight’s, for instance, and some of his compositions have a notable psychedelic quality that cannot really be heard anywhere else in the power/prog field. Especially not in the mid-eighties, when the majority of the song material on ‘Beyond Into The Night Of Day’ was first constructed.

What is remarkable about Othyrworld’s music is that it somehow retained its futuristic sound through all these years. The futuristic elements of a lot of sci-fi inspired art from the eighties – be it music, movies or even novels – have become horribly outdated through the years, but ‘Beyond Into The Night Of Day’ sounds like it could have been recorded yesterday. Zawadski’s huge, reverberating snare drum hits could be seen as a period piece, but his kit has a very natural sound, making it sound timeless instead. The same goes for Ulmer’s very bright acoustic and surprisingly dry-sounding electric guitars.

‘Beyond Into The Night Of Day’ is best listened to in one sitting. The fact that many tracks segue into each other suggests that it was intended to be experienced as such. It’s quite hard not to be carried away by the spacey atmosphere if you actually feel it. Ulmer isn’t the most powerful singer in the world, but his laid-back tone and multi-tracked harmonies create a rather unique ambience. And even if you’re having trouble adapting to the vocals, the album is full of lengthy instrumental passages. In fact, the last ten minutes of the album – the spectacular ‘Moon’ – are only accompanied by a few spoken stanzas.

Anyone who loved the melodic power/prog metal of the likes of Crimson Glory, Queensrÿche or maybe early Ray Alder-era Fates Warning and doesn’t mind the vocals being a bit lower in pitch should definitely give Sacred Blade and Othyrworld a chance. ‘Of The Sun + Moon’, ‘Fieldz The Sunshrine’ and the relatively straightforward ‘In The Light Of The Moon’ should have been eighties metal classics, while newer material such as ‘Ethereal Skyline’ and ‘The Alginment’ show a truly one-of-a-kind, laid-back blend of eighties prog metal and psychedelic rock that could have opened a lot of new doors for Othyrworld. Unfortunately, both musicians died – Zawadski earlier this year, Ulmer back in 2013 – but they certainly made their presence on Earth count with this release.

Recommended tracks: ‘Moon’, ‘Of The Sun + Moon’, ‘Fieldz The Sunshrine’

2020
05/31
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Album of the Week 21-2020: Hollow – Between Eternities Of Darkness

Back in the nineties, Sweden had its share of excellent power metal bands that were significantly darker than their German counterparts. But while Morgana Lefay and Tad Morose did manage to build somewhat of a following, there aren’t many people who seem to remember Hollow. Both ‘Modern Cathedral’ and ‘Architect Of The Mind’ were excellent proggy power metal albums in a style comparable to Crimson Glory and early Queensrÿche, with some Nevermore-ish contemporary touches for good measure. The band quietly faded away, but in late 2018, singer/guitarist Andreas Stoltz suddenly returned with ‘Between Eternities Of Darkness’, another excellent power/prog album.

More so than ‘Modern Cathedral’ and ‘Architect Of The Mind’, ‘Between Eternities Of Darkness’ does an admirable job concealing its complexity. There probably would not be a lot of experts willing to label the material progressive, because it’s largely in 4/4 and the album is chock-full of strong melodies. Even when Stoltz plays the verse-chorus structure fairly straight, however, there is often a change in time feel or a variation during repeated sections making the songs far more complex than those of many of Hollow’s peers. Except for maybe Elegy, another sadly forgotten band that Hollow frequently is reminiscent of on ‘Between Eternities Of Darkness’.

The album is really a solo work of Stoltz, as he wrote all the music and performed all the instruments. A drummer is credited in Stalder Zantos, but I’m pretty sure that’s Stoltz himself or it means the drums are programmed; what other duo consists of two people whose names are exact anagrams of each other? But even musically, ‘Between Eternities Of Darkness’ is dominated by Stoltz’s melodic, somewhat intricate riffs and multi-tracked vocals. These vocals – generally high-pitched and emotional – could be a turn-off for some people, but I think they are exactly what the album needed to get its story across.

Oh yeah, there is a story on ‘Between Eternities Of Darkness’, about a family on the run from their past, only to see the kid go down the wrong path anyway. Since Stoltz’s vocals are so upfront, it’s hard to zone out, but I do think he does a great job giving the story a certain gravitas. The saddest moments have bright-sounding acoustic guitars as a basis (‘Shadow World’, ‘Say Farewell’), while the compositions and arrangements get a little more dense during the tenser moments (‘Down’, ‘The Road I’m On’), though always with a highly memorable chorus. Hollow is still best when they combine both extremes. The contrasts in ‘Fate Of The Jester’ open the song up beautifully during its chorus, for example, while ‘Death Of Her Dream’ brilliantly balances melancholy and turbulence.

Returns of bands that never had a large audience to begin with always make me less suspicious than reunions of those who do and ‘Between Eternities Of Darkness’ is a great example of why I think that way. Stoltz obviously recorded this album because he had something to say that he couldn’t express with Binary Creed. In addition, it’s admirable how he created this thing on his own without it sounding like an ego fest. While he proves to have immense skills as both a singer and a guitarist, the melodies are clearly what defines ‘Between Eternities Of Darkness’. Fans of any band mentioned in this review should definitely check this out.

Recommended tracks: ‘Fate Of The Jester’, ‘Down’, ‘Death Of Her Dream’, ‘The Road I’m On’

2020
05/24
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Album of the Week 20-2020: Triptykon with the Metropole Orkest – Requiem


No announcements, hardly any crowd noise, two thirds of the material never played before or since… Even live albums aren’t done in a conventional way by Triptykon. Of course, a conventional live album was never the set-up of ‘Requiem’. It combines the first and third acts of a requiem released during two completely different stages of Celtic Frost’s career with a brand new second act. Three tracks won’t sound like enough to even fill an EP, but keep in mind that the second act is over half an hour long. The Dutch Metropole Orkest helps add extra depth to the music.

Even more so than studio albums ‘Eparistera Daimones’ and ‘Melana Chasmata’, ‘Requiem’ is a highly inaccessible work. Using an orchestra does nothing to weaken the minimalism that characterizes most of Thomas Gabriel Fischer’s compositions. If anything, the orchestra enhances it. With a band like Triptykon, where you can often make a sandwich between guitar strums, but somehow without ever moving even close to drone territory, the temptation is to have the orchestra fill in the blanks, but the arrangement that Dark Fortress and Alkaloid frontman Florian Magnus Maier made with Fischer and guitarist V. Santura emphasizes space and the low end of the spectrum. An excellent choice.

‘Requiem’ kicks off with the oldest act ‘Rex Irae’, which was originally released on Celtic Frost’s 1987 ‘Into The Pandemonium’ album. On that particular album, the track always seemed a better idea than an actual song to me, but after hearing this live arrangement, the truth was probably that nobody was quite sure how to mix gothic doom metal with an orchestra at the time. The sound is far more balanced and while I initially found Tunisian singer Safa Heraghi to be an odd choice for the female lead vocals, she turns out to be perfect. A singer with a more classical background would probably lack the edge needed for the song. Heraghi is a great singer, but she also appears to have an understanding for Triptykon’s inherent grotesquerie.

The main attraction of ‘Requiem’, however, is the 32 minute second act ‘Grave Eternal’, written in 2018 and 2019 specifically for this performance. At times, it feels like a variation on the final movement of Mahler’s ninth symphony, only with an avantgardist metal band as a part of the orchestra. Huge single-note doom riffs and drums that sound like Hannes Grossmann hits them with sledgehammers, in conjunction with an elegant, but not too bombastic orchestral arrangement and tortured vocals. Most of the track is instrumental, with only a few lines of lyrics, though Heraghi and the choir contribute some otherworldly, wordless melodies. Particularly gorgeous is the fragile minute and a half guitar solo Santura plays around the three-minute mark, but the climax that slowly unfolds from around twenty minutes in is a work of pure genius as well.

Just like any other Triptykon release, ‘Requiem’ isn’t easy to grasp. As a listener, you have to be able to absorb the immense darkness in the compositions, but if you are, chances are ‘Requiem’ will not let you go. It is truly a dark symphony, with an orchestra that emphasizes the bass range and includes a metal band. That is another part of the genius of ‘Requiem’: the Metropole Orkest isn’t just there to provide an extra layer. The orchestra cooperates closely with the band. Even when they are playing in unusual combinations, such as with only Grossmann and Vanja Šlajh’s deep rumbling bass, they have no problem adapting to their musical surroundings. If you can handle ‘Requiem’, it will easily be one of the top releases this year.

Recommended tracks: ‘Grave Eternal’

2020
05/17
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Album of the Week 19-2020: Stormlord – Far


Maybe I should just start a series of these. Since ‘Hesperia’ didn’t really do anything for me, I initially didn’t pay much attention to Stormlord’s sixth album ‘Far’. Big mistake. ‘Far’ rivals ‘Mare Nostrum’ as the Italians’ best album and is undoubtedly the next step in their evolution from extreme to epic heavy metal. As this transition is so gradual, I doubt if the album would alineate many Stormlord fans, but they may just gain a couple that would usually stay away from extreme metal as a whole. That is the mark of a good band that doesn’t neatly fit any existing categories.

Stylistically, Stormlord has never sounded this close to actual epic heavy metal. Not that they sound anything like Manilla Road or the likes, as the seven-string guitars, David Folchitto’s occasional blastbeats and Cristiano Borchi’s extremely harsh vocal performance keeps the music firmly in a contemporary idiom. But the grand, sweeping orchestrations and the heroic guitar melodies give Stormlord more depth than bands with similar origins. Also, ‘Far’ contains significantly more clean male vocals than any of the band’s earlier works. Initially, I was disappointed that the fantastic deep, gothic voice of guitarist Gianpaolo Caprino was once again severely underutilized, but Marco Palazzi’s semi-operatic guest vocals certainly increase the epic nature of the overall sound.

For those who fear that Stormlord has lost its edge: don’t. While many bands that fit the aforementioned description have the guitars drowned out by the orchestrations, Stormlord is still very much a guitar-driven band on ‘Far’. Keyboard player Riccardo Studer is omnipresent, he even co-mixed the album, but his lush orchestrations primarily take on a supportive role behind the guitars. Even his two solo compositions, ‘Sherden’ and ‘Invictus’, aren’t vehicles for his skills. The former is carried by keyboards melodically, but is also heavy and forceful, while the latter may actually be the perfect song for old school Stormlord fans to start with.

While metal albums of the more epic variety tend to be best listened to in one sitting, ‘Far’ does have its share of stand-out tracks. ‘Crimson’ was an immediate favorite due to its remarkably blunt, aggressive riffing and rhythms, although it does feature some compositional sophistication later on. ‘Mediterranea’ has a brilliant structure that gives its riffs room to breathe, while also featuring Caprino’s vocals prominently, while the almost tranquil opening of the title track has something of a ‘Twilight Of The Gods’-era Bathory feel. ‘Vacuna’ and the somewhat more open ‘Levante’ are an excellent finale. ‘Cimmeria’ is a more ambitious, almost proggy track and definitely one of the crowning achievements of ‘Far’.

So yes, while I would have preferred an album that Gianpaolo Caprino had a more prominent vocal role on, ‘Far’ leaves nothing to be desired stylistically and compositionally. The album shows a band refusing to stand still and make the same album twice in a row. And although that is admirable, I do hope the next Stormlord album has more than a bit in common with ‘Far’ in terms of its compositional approach. The niche that the Italian sextet found for itself suits them perfectly. ‘Far’ is at the very least on par with their previous masterpiece ‘Mare Nostrum’, but it may just be a hair better.

Recommended tracks: ‘Crimson’, ‘Cimmeria’, ‘Mediterranea’, ‘Far’

2020
05/10
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Album of the Week 18-2020: Morgana Lefay – The Secret Doctrine


Possibly topping my list of metal bands that never got the recognition they deserved because the nineties happened is Morgana Lefay. Being mislabelled is part of the problem, as the Swedes were always lumped in with their country’s power metal scene, which doesn’t do them any justice. Morgana Lefay’s music was always darker, generally slower and much more contemporary than that of their peers. Also, Charles Rytkönen is one of the most amazingly expressive lead singers in metal history. While the band would get even better, ‘The Secret Doctrine’ proves they had most of their strengths figured out early in their career.

In a way, I understand the mislabelling issue. Morgana Lefay isn’t the easiest band to categorize. There are vague similarities to Crimson Glory and ‘Into The Mirror Black’-era Sanctuary, but Morgana Lefay isn’t quite as proggy. The riffs of Tony Eriksson and Tommi Karppanen are significantly heavier as well, which combined with the moderate, almost doomy tempos of most of their material makes the music feel like a bit of precursor to the later groove/thrash trend. Those bands never had the degree of theatricality the Swedes have though, with Rytkönen’s clean, but raw vocals often drawing somewhat justified comparisons to Savatage’s Jon Oliva.

Whatever this type of metal is called, however, it’s excellent.  Eriksson and Karpannen kick in your teeth with their thick riffs, which despite their obvious thrash influence get quite a great deal of their power from the slow tempos. Their palm mutes are incredibly punchy, but they don’t overpower the mix. Because of these subdued tempos, the somewhat faster tracks like ‘Paradise Lost’ and ‘Dying Evolution’ immediately feel like ripping thrashers without interrupting the overal bleak atmosphere. Elsewhere, the steep contrast between bright-sounding acoustic guitars and crushing heaviness justifies the “power” in power ballads ‘The Mirror’, ‘Alley Of Oaks’ and ‘Last Rites’.

Another reason why ‘The Secret Doctrine’ is the best early Morgana Lefay record is the relative lack of filler. Sure, ‘Last Rites’ and the title track are remakes from their (extremely limitedly distributed) debut album ‘Symphony Of The Damned’, but they fit the overall atmosphere here. Only the juvenile ‘State Of Intoxication’ is a bit shallow, but that is abundantly compensated for by excellent mid-tempo crushers like ‘Rooms Of Sleep’, ‘Nowhere Island’, ‘What Am I’, ‘Cold World’ and the vaguely oriental-sounding ‘Soldiers Of The Holy Empire’. Even the unimaginatively-titled ‘Lord Of The Rings’, which literally quotes the opening poem of ‘The Fellowship Of The Ring’, is a surprisingly entertaining stomper.

Though ‘The Sacred Doctrine’ is not quite as good as the band’s 2004 masterpiece ‘Grand Materia’, it is an early highlight in Morgana Lefay’s discography and without a doubt the best album to pick up if you want to know more about the origins of the Swedish band. Ulf Petersson’s (and the band’s) production is a clear product of the early nineties, but not unlike Scott Burns’ Morrisound productions, I actually think that works in the music’s favor. It gives the guitars a claustrophobic, pulsating feel that fits Morgana Lefay’s downtuned riffing perfectly. If you like your metal darker and more aggressive than the average European power metal band without sacrificing any of the theatricality, there are hardly any better options than Morgana Lefay.

Recommended tracks: ‘Rooms Of Sleep’, ‘The Mirror’, ‘Dying Evolution’, ‘What Am I’

2020
05/03
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