Label: Sun Empire Productions
Date: March 28th, 2021
It’s the end of the summer and everything is reminding us of cold rainy days and endless nights. Those kinds of depressing days are bringing us similar music. Ravnkald, as the name says, a raven who lives in the snow, is calling those cold days to return and hug us.
Synth / black metal project is totally fitting in this picture. I must admit, this is some kind of a modern pagan metal that I am not that familiar with. It has a lot of new riffs, new vocal technic and a depressing note in the background. It’s like Burzum, when we are talking about it, but this is much better.
A spirit of Norway is, of course, present and by that I mean a specific atmosphere of melody in every sound, blast beat, guitar riff and growl. This is not that classic black / pagan metal that we are all used to, like Enslaved or some similar band. It progressed and the sound is much richer.
Synth note in the song “Heilög Vötn”, I and II, is totally remarkable and in the combination with a monologue, it is my favourite on the album. Song “The Pagan Resistance” is the highlight of the album. The lyrics really caught my ear. All capacity of the band is held there, vocals specially. Mister Martyr Lucifer showed his voice’s ability. I was delighted to hear maybe three or four different technics of growl here. That’s very hard but Mister Lucifer made a masterpiece of this album.
In the song “Her Heart is a Grave” something that I really liked is the break at the end that brings calmness. Simple guitar riff that is slowly melting into the rest of the song but really remarkable. Creative piece of music is made by those 3 amazing men. A lot of ideas and music knowledge is held here.
I admire that although they are from Mexico / Italy a spirit of cold Norway, its endless fields of green, forests and snow is still present. So it doesn’t matter where you are from until you feel what you are singing about.
Pagan resistance as a subject of the album is a story of how we should stay true to our beliefs, to give strong resistance to everything that is standing in our way. Very symbolic but packed in a religious sense.
The album cover is typical. Raven with a pagan priest. I prefer those from previous albums of this project but this one is still powerful and eye-catching.
