Old Corpse Road – The Echoes Of Tales Once Told
Genre: Black Metal, Folk Metal
Label: Independent
Old Corpse Road struck an immediate chord with me and my small town past. I lived in Molalla for a while (a tiny, bumfuck town that’s populated by hicks and inbred Christians) and had an experience that parallels one of the yarns on The Echoes Of Tales Once Told. There was a long and overgrown road that you had to pass through to get to the main part of town for where I was staying (miles away… fucking sucked) that was chock full of scary stories and urban legends (and discarded condoms and needles). It lead past the old and mostly forgotten cemetery, which was equidistant from the town and the housing settlement. The path I traveled was actually two paths combined; one from town to the cemetery and the other from the cemetery to the settlement. This creep-tastic path was refered to as “The 420 Trail” by the “cool” high schoolers… but some of the old timers called it, you guessed it, The Old Corpse Road!
Ok, enough of that! Onto the review!
The U.K. five some known as Old Corpse Road, bring a wee bit of superstition to the table with their blackened offering of an EP, The Echoes Of Tales Once Told. Immediately, the listener is pulled in and thrashed about by the torrent of intense melodies and tortured vocals! Also brought into the terrifying turbulence of it all is the addition of a violin, which is uses sparingly and thus, masterfully! Lyrically, OCR dives into their homeland’s darker history to find inspiration (take the little Oakmen for example). As far as musical influences go; Primordial and Emperor… Nuff said!
This EP is only three tracks long… and I’m actually ok with that. Sometimes, all you need is three tracks of PERFECT black metal to be satisfied, you know?
Overall: This album is easily some of the most inventive and intelligent metal I’ve ever heard. The Echoes Of Tales Once Told pulls you in with old world lore and encapsulates you with the vicious black metal that culminates in the feeling dread, produced by ghost from worlds almost forgotten! EP stands for EPIC!!!
10/10
Old Corpse Road On MySpace
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