Behemoth
Sventevith
(Storming Near the Baltic)
[Pagan]
The last of the truly great Behemoth material. Although I'm a true fan
of the band's new stuff, this is head and shoulder's above anything they
could probably ever accomplish again. Far more raw, sickening, and
interesting sounding, the songs on this CD, along with the excellent
"And the Forest's Dream Eternally" mCD should be visited by one and all.
"Chant of the Easter Lands" (or Chart of the Fastern Lards as the print suggests) is one of Behemoth's finer moments. A catchy acoustic guitar riff (something that was used in Behemoth's early tunes, they always combined the acoustic with electrical) flows over the thin sounding black metal, and creates a worthy tune by all standards. Rawness is the name of the game (I suppose that sounds cheesy) here, and the rough production really allows for the music to stand out. A "Bewitching" production simply would not work here (compare "Hidden in a Fog" on this recording to the "Bewitching" one).
The other songs follow in this fashion. Three instrumentals, ranging from acoustic guitar pieces to keyboard tracks encompass these. Vocals are also very important here. While most of you are familiar with the "Grom" deeper style vocals now, Behemoth's older vocals were without a doubt much better. Harsher, angrier, and far sicker sounding (not to mention the Grom vocals can sound terribly absurd at times) are terms that nicely describe them. This is an important album in terms of black metal, it was the last of Behemoth's "real" albums, before they jumped into more "easy-listening" categories. I'm still a fan of the new material obviously, but the earlier albums were still the finest.
© 1997 brand
"Chant of the Easter Lands" (or Chart of the Fastern Lards as the print suggests) is one of Behemoth's finer moments. A catchy acoustic guitar riff (something that was used in Behemoth's early tunes, they always combined the acoustic with electrical) flows over the thin sounding black metal, and creates a worthy tune by all standards. Rawness is the name of the game (I suppose that sounds cheesy) here, and the rough production really allows for the music to stand out. A "Bewitching" production simply would not work here (compare "Hidden in a Fog" on this recording to the "Bewitching" one).
The other songs follow in this fashion. Three instrumentals, ranging from acoustic guitar pieces to keyboard tracks encompass these. Vocals are also very important here. While most of you are familiar with the "Grom" deeper style vocals now, Behemoth's older vocals were without a doubt much better. Harsher, angrier, and far sicker sounding (not to mention the Grom vocals can sound terribly absurd at times) are terms that nicely describe them. This is an important album in terms of black metal, it was the last of Behemoth's "real" albums, before they jumped into more "easy-listening" categories. I'm still a fan of the new material obviously, but the earlier albums were still the finest.
© 1997 brand