Funeral Rain Press Corps

Genre: Death Fuckin’ Metal

Label: Dark Descent Records

Beware, mortals.. for now we step back through time and darkness into the archaic age of old school swedish death metal, and into the grasp of the entity known as Entrails! Originally formed in 1991, Entrails disbanded without releasing anything, but was exhumed in 2008 by guitarist Jimmy Lundqvist. Two demos were released, and the debut album “Tales From The Morgue” finally took shape in 2010, nearly two decades after the inception of the band. Now, with the sophmore effort “The Tomb Awaits” pending release on Dark Descent Records, I had the opportunity to give it a listen in advance.

“The Tomb Awaits” opens with the title track, a soft, beautiful, reflective classical guitar instrumental. It reminds me of “Lamentation” off of God Macabre’s classic Swedeath monolith “The Winterlong”, and I very much appreciated it both as a standalone song and an atmospheric prelude.

But Being a Swedeath junkie, I was not at all surprised when after scarcely a minute of soft acoustic serenading, Entrails turned around and punched me in my goddamn face with about a ton of ripping HM-2 guitar tone. “Unleashed Wrath” is instantly remniscent of the mighty “Left Hand Path”, and segways into one of the stronger tracks on the album, “Crawling Death”, featuring an ominously simple piano intro and nefariously catchy chant of “CRAWLING DEATH!”. This 3 punch combo knocked me on my ass and left me waiting for a weaker track, but Entrails just never let up. It makes me wonder why they ever broke up in the first place.

The riffs! Man, these guys have cool riffs out the ass, all ripped from the amplifier with that absolutely timeless Swedish guitar sound! Every song on this disc has at least a couple riffs that you can’t help but bang your head to (Entrails and their label will be receiving a bill from my chiropractor along with my preorder for a hard copy of the album). From the epic intro of “Undead” to the diabolical tremolo picking of “Total Death”, I was never bored with the visceral Swedish filth assaulting my eardrums.

The leads too, are thoroughly badass, just as much so as the riffs that make up the meat of the songs. Never wanking or shredding overly much, Entrails instead opt for a more melodic, creative approach to guitar solos that contrasts with the surrounding ultraviolence in a way that is very pleasing to the ear, and conjures up the ghost of old school Dismember.

Though this stuff is obviously very traditional (you won’t hear any hyperblasts or extended sweep picking), it still sounds fresh and exciting to me, and it would be a grave mistake to disregard Entrails as a simple retro nostalgia band. If anyone has a right to be playing Left Hand Path death nowadays, it’s these guys, 20 year scene veterans who obviously hold a LOT of pent up creativity. Thoroughly Swedish and thoroughly Death metal, I think “The Tomb Awaits” could have been classic if it had been released in the early 90′s golden era of death metal. Buy this album if you like Entombed, Grave, Unleashed, Dismember, Carnage, and God Macabre. Fuck, just buy this album if you like death metal. A round of applause for Entrails. 8.5/10!

I’d like to introduce this edition of Conjuration of the Sepulchral by apologizing to the many avid readers who I’m sure have been left crushed and without direction by this column’s absence. Real life has been getting in the way of my illustrious career as a metal sage, but I’ve thought long and hard about my priorities and realized that shit’s overrated. Now back to the death metal.

This week we will be sampling a fine Swedish vintage with a very un-Swedish flavor. Gorement from Nyköping, Sweden. I have never seen them discussed in any magazine like Terrorizer, Zero Tolerance, or Metal Maniacs, or any larger metal site like blabbermouth or metal-rules.net, but they maintain a dedicated cult following among die-hard old school death metal fans. And for good reason; their only album, the magnum opus “The Ending Quest”, is a masterpiece of atypical melanchoic death metal.

Their style is hard to describe; Swedeath cliches are eschewed. No HM-2 pedal Left Hand Path Guitar tone, no d-beat drumming. A very strong sense of melody is present, but so are monolithic grooving death riffs. Hyperblasting madness flows seamlessly into gossamer melodies that evoke soltitude inspire contemplation. To me, the entire approach of Gorement conveys an ancient, inhuman sense of esoteric knowing and despair. It could perhaps be described as the reminiscing of an ancient entity that has seen the rise and fall of  countless gods and nations, and knows that all things good things come to an end. Check it out here, and buy Gorement’s “Darkness of the Dead” compilation or the vinyl re-issue of “The Ending Quest” from Necroharmonic Records.

Genre: Gothic Metal, Doom

Label: Napalm Records

Ah, Draconian. When referring to a law or the application therefor of, it means to be extremely harsh and/or outdated. But when referring to the Swedish gothic doom band, this is most certainly not the case! I wonder if there is an actual correlation between the name they chose and their music? Maybe they sing in the language of the dragons?

As soon as things start moving along, I’m instantly reminded of Battlelore. A tired and overdone comparison I’m sure, but an accurate one at that (Yes, I know that Draconian predates their Finnish label mates by about five years, but I heard Battlelore first so the comparison stands further). Opening track The Drowning Age is a behemoth of steel thorns and rows and rows of severed heads on pikes! Every time I hear the line, “Let’s bring our Gods to the gallows; a new moon will shine on you!” I get the goosebumps!  (Plus, any song that mentions the Chimera is insta-win in my book since it’s my daughter’s name.)

If there’s one thing that Draconian does right in A Rose For The Apocalypse, it’s the darkly romantic mood it casts in both the lyrical and instrumental senses. Elysian Night is an excellent example of this with it’s slow tempo, melodic female vocals (also the best song to just sit and groove on her singing as well) and expertly sectioned synths. The later is something that most bands of this kind of genre tend to overuse or turn into a gimmick. Thankfully, Draconian does not.

However, what they do overuse is they same basic song structure for just about every song on the album. If you don’t mind your gothic doom a little on the repetitive side (and how can you not since it’s another pitfall that these type of bands fall into) then this won’t bug you in the slightest.

Overall: A Rose For The Apocalypse is an extremely enjoyable album. From the depths of the nightmare evoking growls to height of the ethereal lyrics, Draconian drinks from the chalice of awesome!  …even if none of them sound like Sean Connery. (BOOM! Dragonheart reference!)

9/10

Draconian Official

Draconian On Facebook

Draconian On MySpace

Genre: Ambient, Industrial, Experimental

Label: Malignant Records

And here we are again with another collection of new, re-released and previously unreleased music. This time, it’s from The Swedish Ironic Commando known as Negru Voda. Oh… and did I mention that there is THREE DISCS WORTH of music in Vald De Luxe? This is going to be an endurance trial that could end in ambient madness, isn’t it?

Three Hours Later…

…I think I jizzed a little.

Negru Voda’s four years in the making, Vald De Luxe is easily the most diverse sounding ambient album I’ve ever laid my ears on! There’s a ton of distorted vocals, lots of mild static, soft feedback in some spots that EXPLOEDES on you if you’re not ready for it, wrenches hitting pipes, mothers slapping babies, a kitchen sink and a partrige in a pare tree! I think it goes without saying at this point but, Vald De Luxe is DENSE! One of the reasons might be due to the fact that this collection is split up into different albums.

Disc 1: Vald De Luxe – This disc houses the newest material that is, in my opinion, the strongest material of the three. Lots of light and airy tracks that are laid in contrast next to some pretty fucking heavy tracks! Most noticeably, Infected By Remix which is a remixed version of the gut-ripping V:28 song, Infected By Life (if you don‘t know who V:28 is, do yourself a favor and check them out!).

Disc 2: Dark Territory – An appropriately named disc if there ever was one! Originally released in 1998 to the tune of five hundred copies, Dark Territory is a down and dirty mixture of industrial and dark ambient. Dark Territory transports you to an Eraserhead-ish land of rubble, mutants and black and white industrial areas. It’s literally the stuff of nightmares.

Disc 3: Whispers From The Silent Shaft – This one is the most diverse in terms of release type. Most of the tracks come from different periods in the artist’s career, so there’s a schizophrenic element to this disc with certain styles clashing. Yes, clashing. But not ever really breaking the flow at all. And what’s this? A live track to take us out with? How thoughtful!

Overall: Vald De Luxe is a monster of a release! Each of these three discs would of done great standing on their individual merit, so you know that a release with all three (if you can, play them back-to-back-to-back) is going to send you through a damn wall!

10/10

Negru Voda On MySpace

Genres: Melodic Death Metal, Melodic Black Metal

Label: Abyss Records

Hyperborean are a Swedish band formed in 2000, and the newest addition to the Abyss Records roster. The Spirit of Warfare is their just released debut. My gut instinct is to compare this to Arsis, but I shouldn’t, because I can’t stand Arsis, and I must say, I quite enjoyed this tidy little slab of melodic death/black/power/whatever.

They play, as they state on their myspace, symphonic extreme metal. I was a little reluctant to listen to this, because I was under the impression that this was straight melodeath, which I will admit I am a little prejudiced against. However, in the space of 49 minutes and 19 seconds, the legions of Hyperborean besieged and conquered my ears without mercy.

This isn’t trite wanky crap like Arsis, but a glorious and epic soundscape that blends melodic death metal, black metal, and very tasteful use of symphonic elements (read: not Dimmu Borgir). In fact, the symphonic elements, mainly consisting of occasional piano, are so subtle I’m not sure that “symphonic” is a good label to attach to this band.

As I mentioned above, the press email I received says this band was formed in 2000, and it shows. This music sounds like it took time write, enduring the collective scrutiny of the band many times before being recorded for The Spirit of Warfare. All of the songs sound tight and professional, with absolutely none of the signs of amateurism or immaturity that are sometimes present on a debut album. Most of the songs are pretty long, with 4 around 7 minutes and one above 10 minutes, but they don’t feel like it. The band offer enough variation to keep the listener captivated, and the beautiful thing about that is they do it without one dimensional shredding solos or unnecessary vain technicality. The mood evoked changes throughout the album, but as a whole the Spirit of Warfare captures a feeling of oncoming battle and inevitable triumph, of burning cities and banners fluttering in the wind above fields of carnage. Noble riffs gallop forward over tense, dramatic drumming, punctuated by a raspy and passionate yet very controlled vocals delivery.

I’d say this is a must have for fans of melodic death or black metal, perhaps for someone who likes Dissection or At The Gates. Stand out tracks are “Channeling the Spirit of Warfare” and “The Last Stand of Leonidas and the Battle of Thermopylae”. My applause gentlemen, you’ve earned 7.5/10, and I think someone with more a taste for the melodic would rate this as high as a 9/10.

Hyperborean on myspace