Check out our preview of the new Rock and Metal albums coming out this week!
Tag Archives: Sammath
PREVIEW: New Music Friday Rock and Metal New Album Releases 6-16-23
Kjeld – Skym
After forming in 2003, Dutch quintet Kjeld has finally got round to releasing their debut album, with the wait presumably down to the difficulty the band has had in translating their lyrical concepts of anti-cosmic mysticism and the nature of death into the Friesian language, a difficult tongue to master. Well, the wait was worth it, for Skym (Hammerheart) is a suitably grim piece of Second-wave worship that fans of Gorgoroth and Enthroned will lap up like blood from a chalice.
With a knack for imbuing searing black metal riffs with a feeling of unease and coldness like the true greats of the genre, the band members have evidently put a lot of thought and effort into crafting the songs for this debut effort. The slightly murky production, with the snare drum in particular high in the mix, ensures that the atmosphere is claustrophobic and full of dread while the pace remains varied throughout.
Although rooted in the light-speed riffing of the Norwegian great and good, as demonstrated on the aggressive opening salvo of ‘Tûzen Sinnen’ and the title track, the lurch into mid-paced suicidal depressive black metal territory on the Forgotten Tomb-worshipping ‘Gerlofs Donia’ is evidence that the band have a few tricks up their sleeves, further demonstrated by the monolithic power of classy album closer ‘Bern Fan Freya.’
While their fellow countrymen Sammath failed to stake a claim for the importance of black metal from the Low Countries with the disappointing Godless Arrogance (Hammerheart), Kjeld has proven that relatively gimmick-free black metal still has a future and that there’s a lot to be said in waiting to ensure you get your debut release right instead of rushing things and being disappointed with the result. On that basis, Kjeld have begun their career in just the right way.
7.0/10
JAMES CONWAY
Sammath – Godless Arrogance
Let’s get it on the table – Godless Arrogance (Hammerheart) is well played and excellently produced with a good energy. Frontman J. Kruitwagen unleashes powerful, feral howls, and Koos Bos shines with a 36 minute holocaust from behind the kit. This is a decent black metal release with very obvious Gorgoroth and Immortal reference points.
However, for all its competency, like so many faceless corpse-painted albums before it, Godless Arrogance is pointless. It has no personality, no individuality and serves no real purpose. Not every album should, or can be boundary pushing, but sticking rigidly to a style and formula that has been stuck rigidly to for nigh on twenty years by countless others leaves them in the middle of an unspectacular and very large pack.
Black Metal is intrinsically a scene of contradiction – claiming rebellion and anarchy while entrenched in blatant retrospection and reverence to a select few hallowed reference points. But these days it’s a blunted rebellion, stunted by a refusal to move beyond a formula that was first laid down 25 years ago by Bathory and then refined and defined by Darkthrone, Burzum, Mayhem, Emperor et al.
Staring out the window wistfully, a half-grin plays on the lips as fond memories tickle the brain of a time when black metal was exciting and boasted creativity and diversity, when acts mutated and pushed boundaries. Sadly Godless Arrogance, for all its’ sonic strength and no matter how well played it is, lacks any desire to be anything other than just another black metal album. If they were alone in their Gorgoroth/Immortal worship, then I might think more kindly, but it’s over 20 years since Pure Holocaust (Osmose) and 19 since Antichrist (Malicious). The repetition of sound and style by Sammath and others is well beyond boring now.
5.0/10
STEVE TOVEY