SHADES OF BLACK: ABIGORUM, MISERY, RAAT, OBLITI DEVORAVIT

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  No Responses »
Jul 242022
 


“Dracula’s castle” by Daniele Serra

I’m afraid I have no time to set the stage today with introductory comments, other than to fore-warn you that the moods of today’s selections are intensely dark and packed with pain. Paradoxically, the intensity may make you feel terrifyingly alive and perversely spellbound.

ABIGORUM (Georgia/Germany)

In 2021 Abigorum released their latest album, Vergessene Stille. On that record, the band had been reduced to the size of a duo, combining the talents of Russian musician Aleksey Korolyov (who now lives in Georgia) and German guitarist/vocalist Tino Thiele (from Wulfgar and Metamorph).

In the lead-in to that album we premiered a song named “Erhebt eure mit Blut gefüllten Hörner“, which managed to create an experience that was both hypnotizing and nightmarish, both hauntingly seductive and terrorizing. It was not alone in those respects, as we’ve been reminded by a new video for another song off that album. Continue reading »

SHADES OF BLACK: FERNDAL, MYSTAGOS, HYPNOS, MORAST, ERDVE, MISERY, EDEN WEINT IM GRAB

 Album Reviews, SHADES OF BLACK, SHORT BUT SWEET  10 Responses »
Feb 082017
 

 

Those of you impeccably tasteful metal aficionados who follow my Shades of Black posts know that I was too incapacitated to get one done for last Sunday. So I’m doing one now, although none of the songs collected here was included in what I planned to write about for last Sunday. I discovered all of these since then. I do still plan to complete the write-up I had originally conceived, perhaps later this week or at least for this coming Sunday.

FERNDAL

Yesterday, I was reminded about a German label named Einheit Produktionen by seeing their release schedule for the spring. I would have discovered these plans sooner if I’d been paying closer attention to our daily e-mail flood.

In April, Einheit will be discharging the self-titled debut album of a German black metal band named Ferndal, whose influences are described by Einheit as “reaching from Darkthrone to Windir, from Beethoven to Arvo Pärt and from baroque grace to romantic melancholy, within a veil of pure black metal aggression”. Is it any wonder I paused in my scurrying to have a listen to the first teaser of music? Continue reading »