Hesperian Death Horse - Živ (2018)
When we last heard from the Croatian
group of Hesperian Death Horse, the year was 2014, and they'd not
only done a concept split with fellow Croats Hazarder (on the theme
of Nikola Tesla), but also released their first full-length album.
Now that they've returned, they've revealed that said first album
(Mrtav) was actually the
first part of a concept album trilogy, starting with death and ending
with birth. Živ is
the step between those extremes, with the title translating to
'life,' and featuring (like Mrtav)
four songs, each bearing a subtitle. Živ
is also a bit shorter than that first album, but considering that
relative durations of life and death, that seems appropriate.
With a
deep and brooding atmosphere combining doom's weight with blackened
virulence, the music grows in creeping fashion, moving through
passages of slow-moving heaviness and faster aggression (kind of like
life, you may be thinking). The synthesis of the two produces some
great tension and stirring melodic developments, and the sections
which cycle a riff while gradually escalating the harshness really
bring the emotional thrust to bear with finesse. HDH find an
impressive amount of range and material to be drawn from the
interaction of the two styles, and while the length of the album
makes it prime for vinyl issuing (fingers crossed), it's also likely
to leave you hungry for more. Of course, that's much preferable to
having too much piled on, so cheers to the Croatian crew for the
excellent album, and here's hoping it's not quite so long until the
last piece of the trilogy is set upon the world.
~
Gabriel
For
Fans Of; Heavydeath, Mamaleek, Open Tomb, Ulver, WarHorse
~
No comments:
Post a Comment