STORMLORD - Supreme Art Of War LP (Black Vinyl)

Come with a poster.

I am once again on my self righteous quest of heralding insignificant underground death/black metal records as essential parts of mankind's art history and I am still waiting for an angry mob of high school professors with torches and pitchforks to carry me into the night and hang my stupid skinny ass on the next tree while cursing me in latin and eating tiny biscuits. But I guess I am not important enough for that. Well, it's their loss. Today we are looking closely on an album that feels like a little brother to everything that Bal Sagoth (a fantasy metal project that kills all other fantasy metal projects before they are even born) ever did. A little brother with enough strength and poetry to fight his own battles at any family dinner.

The overall atmosphere on this album is incredibly warm, bordering on "hot" sometimes. Like you just got sunburned next to the Egyptian pyramids or on some Sicilian beach. The high shrieks of the croaking screamer Christiano have that certain "hysterical duck quality" that I admired on "In the Nightside Eclipse" by Emperor or also the debut of Setherial (Get that shit, seriously!) but they do not sing about dark or blue fjord skies and frosty rocks covered by virgin blood, snow and goat guts this time. This is an album for the long and dreaming days of summer. We have fast blasts, windy thrash runs and power metal beats, rich double bass servings and fulfilling cymbal crashes and I have to give the drummer kudos for not falling into the trap of using only one style of moving things forward. This is as varied as it can be without a single showy drum solo in the mix. A drummer that is an equal amongst equals and not the blind rhythm machine for better men. Thank you, sir!