Necrophobic - Hrimthursum
Regain Records - RR 093 - 2006
By Brandon Strader
With songtitles like
'The Slaughter of Baby Jesus', I figured this was either really horrible stereotype black metal, or comedy black metal... I pressed play and began listening to said track, which is the introduction to the album. Some ambient sounds, and a sample of a baby crying amongst some timpanis being pounded... At this point of my listening experience, I still had no idea whether it would be stereotypical or comedic, but the orchestration and the operatic vocals which followed the timpanis was very impressive, and I slowly began to forget the whole baby crying sample and took in this new symphonic melodic sound.
I would have to say
Necrophobic is a stereotypical symphonic black metal group, yet they have enough originality and excitement within their compositions to hide that. After all, the stereotype hides only in the lyrical part of the album and you can never tell what black metal vocalists are saying half the time anyway. The music is extremely intense and melodic, even though it temporarily forsakes the orchestrations early on in the first real song. A rhythm is accompanied by a melodic lead, which evolves into a tremolo rhythm smothered by the vocalist's hefty satanic screams.
The scream has a much lower pitch than say,
Dimmu Borgir vocalist
Shagrath. It also exceeds
Dimmu Borgir in having a faster tempo, more excitement, great solos that you can actually hear throughout the album, and an all-around better atmosphere and grimness. Would you think that is a pretty tough feat to tackle? If so, you've got to check these guys out as soon as possible. After listening to the album, you will agree -
Necrophobic sounds like something of their own, not so stereotypical and not comedic at all, even if there is a sampled baby Jesus crying in the intro.
8/10
UM’s Review Rating Scale
Official Necrophobic Website
Official Regain Records Website
