Style: folk inspired black metal, experimental black metal, ambient
Primary Emotions/Themes: Odd song structures, time signatures, and influence come together to create an album that sounds odd yet entirely compelling at the same time
Thoughts: The first five minutes of N Crugu Bradului are a perfect snap shot for the whole album. The first minute is nothing but ambient pads and nature sounds. It transitions slowly into two guitars strumming single notes over each other, slowly, delicately. Then by two minutes we have the whole band coming in and playing a riff that sounds completely different out of the right speaker than it does the left. When the vocals finally do come in, the whole band seems to be doing their own thing. The bass is off playing unrelated notes, the guitars both have their own speaker, and the drums are just trying to do something that makes it all hang together by a thread.
Then 3:30 seconds comes in. This is where everyone stops their individual noodling and the band formulates one of the single most powerful riffs I've heard in a long time. It is laser focused and everyone in the band is doing exactly what they need to to make the music sound good and cohesive. It's such a huge change from everything else that came before it that it still takes me aback after all these years of listening.
The remainder of the album follows this formula to various degrees. The band largely does whatever they want, with moments where it all comes together. It shouldn't sound good, yet somehow it does. This is Ulcerate's riffing style before Ulcerate was even a thing. A masterwork of a record.
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