Rimthurs is an entity hailing from Sweden and it has been formed some time in the mid nineties but hasn´t been very active until early 2000s. This is the third full length opus containing eight songs. Rimthurs is in fact a one man entity spawned by creature called Niflfarinn, who did guitars, drums and vocals, with help of Mordh on bass. The music is fast and relentless black metal done in old school nineties way, but midst all aggression there are atmospheric acoustic parts and clean vocals with melancholy and birds singing like being in the deep woods, just listen to Mot Undergang. So, there is a melancholy and atmosphere with so many emotions in the music, that reminds again why black metal is such superb form of music. Lyrics are in Swedish I think, I don´t speak the language, but judging by my knowledge of Germanic roots of words they are more nature and maybe pagan oriented depicting beauty of Nordic landscape, darkness and inner feelings. I also must mention Eldens Andar being my highlight with changing from ritualistic Nordic drums to blast beats and back with haunting clean melody mixing with black metal tremolos. Half of the album are a bit longer songs but they do not get boring for a second and this one is an intense listening for all black metal fiends out there. Another great entity from Sweden is upon us!
Greece has always been a Mediterranean country with vast and beautiful black and death metal scene with so many original and great bands coming to mind immediately, their unique music put Greece on a map of world extreme music scene and Mind Erasure is one of the bands from that country that will certainly help put Greece to the front even more. This is the debut full length opus and it contains 11 songs. Mind Erasure play epic and at times raw black metal with some thrash and death metal parts thrown in the songs. From the atmospheric intro of Proem and aggressive death black of Pray For Salvation, real jewels come afterwards. One of my personal favorites is beautiful epic, almost symphonic Azrael with all those clean vocal parts, epic synth and quire background and that Greek trademark mid tempo which turns into beating thrash last part of the song. I must also mention as my favorite the trilogy of songs at the end of the album with title As Firs Light Never Comes, those being Seal´s Break, Apocalypse and Life´s Epilogue, great symphony of melody and darkness. This is an excellent album, a real little dark jewel in the crown of mighty Greek scene.
Svalinn´s Rift are new to the scene and they are hailing from Hungary. This trio is playing black metal, more of Norse oriented in thematic and lyrics with a touch of folk thrown in like in awesome Ice Waves And The Primordial Giant. This is their debut e.p. opus and it contains four songs of minimalistic yet complex mixture of epic and raw pagan black metal with warrior attitude and mixes emotions with warrior spirit, some thing that is quickly forgotten in nowadays black metal. There are not so much blast beats, this band is rather oriented on varied tempo from mid to aggressive and almost ritualistic parts in some songs. Lyrics are in English but I would rather if these guys sang in their native Hungarian, because that country has a beautiful language. Anyway, strong debut release.
KRAYKULLA-WEBZINE 