Be'Lakor - Of Breath And Bone

Be'lakor are a band I’ve been meaning to get round to listening to for a while now. Mainly because every single music recommendation service I have signed up for has recommended them. With the discovery of their latest album, Of Breath And Bone, on the money-pit that is Bandcamp I thought it about time I gave it a whirl.


Cut from the same cloth as melodeath legends Insomnium and recent favourites Omnium Gatherum, Be'lakor have presented a beautifully crafted melodic death album to the world while eschewing a name that ends in “-um”. Stylistically sitting about halfway between the previously mentioned bands, Be'lakor incorporate thundering rhythms and lyrical dexterity with intricate melody and a healthy helping of blast beats and crunchy riffage.


Lyrically the songs on Of Breath And Bone are one of two sorts. The earlier tracks are cryptic but clear enough to infer the disquieting gist, and the latter are fully fledged stories of loss and despair, as is fitting for the genre. I have quite enjoyed sitting with the lyrics and deciphering the songs as I listen. Some I still have no clue about, but even the imagery evoked by the short choruses is packed with mystery and gothic charm.


Even the songs with complete stories can take some deciphering. Absit Omen, for instance, seems for all the world cryptic and impenetrable on first listen, but a couple of goes in and with the lyrics handy there is an “Oooh!” moment when it clicks. In Parting is another brilliant track telling a heavy hitting story of loss and ignorance that gets all the way to the crushing finale before eliciting a wide-eyed “holy shit” from this listener.


The nature of the tales, the delicately balance melody and heaviness, the morality plays and the tales if helplessness are all captured, somewhat whimsically perhaps, in the cover art. A slightly modified version of Gabriel Ferrier’s Chaperon Rouge insinuates an unseen, unsettling extra depth to the tales within.


On the whole I am very glad I gave this album a listen. Now I need to go back and acquire the band’s first two albums which, from what I hear on the Internet, are just as good. I think Be'lakor’s only flaw is that they are in a saturated market. In the last 5 years the number of melodeath bands has risen immensely and it becomes hard to stand out from the crowd. It’s so easy for the music to disappear into the noise. To become “just another beautifully crafted melodic death album.” Omnium Gatherum’s latest failed to inspire as its predecessor, New World Shadows, had done, not because it was bad, but because it was nothing new. Thankfully for Be'lakor the melodeath ingredients have been added in just the right quantities and mixed in just the right way to make something worthy of remark.

My Top 10 Essential Metal Albums

While watching Gojira at the Corporation in Sheffield the other day, I was challenged to produce my Top 10 Essential Metal Albums. The albums that I keep going back to, or have some special meaning to me. It's obviously a very personal list and I can guarantee that just about everybody in the world will find fault with it, but that's the point of these things, isn't it?

Dark Tranquillity - We Are The Void Dark Tranquillity's latest album (although it is now five years old), and the one I have played most by a very large margin. I have even played it twice as much as Projector, my previous favourite. Featuring some shudderingly creepy melodeath riffs and covering all the classic Gothenburg bases, you can't go far wrong with this one. It's hard to choose a favourite track of this album, but I guess Shadow In Our Blood or Iridium would take it. Or Her Silent Language, or The Grandest Accusation. One of those, anyway.

Opeth - Ghost Reveries There will always be controversy over choosing a favourite Opeth album, but this is mine, narrowly beating Blackwater Park to the top spot (thanks to my decision to only have one album by any given band in the list). Of all the Opeth albums I have on my iPod (most of them) it's the one I return to time and again for my fix of proggy deathy growliness. The Grand Conjuration is probably the best track, but like We Are The Void there are too many good ones. The cover of Soldier of Fortune is bloody good, too.

Lacuna Coil - Comalies From way back in the days when I was finding my metal feet, as it were, Comalies contains just enough heavy, just enough catchy to get me hooked. This was my gateway drug to a love affair with melodic death metal, of all things. Top track would be Tight Rope, which gives me a little nerdgasm for recognising the game the voiceover samples are taken from.

Agalloch - Marrow Of The Spirit I heard about Agalloch long before I heard Agalloch, and when I finally did hear them, I wondered why I hadn't looked them up before. Dark and disquieting and epic in equal measure. Favourite track would have to be, um, all the tracks. Seriously, I can't choose between them.

Judas Priest - Painkiller The one and only venture into NWOBHM on this list. As must as Iron Maiden is seen as the pinnacle of British heavy metal, you just can't beat Painkiller for volume or tempo. I did air guitar to the title track a couple of months ago and my left shoulder still hasn't forgiven me. My favourite tracks are Painkiller, obviously, and Night Crawler.

Insomnium - Above The Weeping World Although in recent months it has been pushed aside in favour of One For Sorrow, Above The Weeping World is still Insomnium's magnum opus, and proof that they are still one of the finest melodic death bands in the business. I'm starting to think I shouldn't have tried to include a favourite track. On this one The Gale, Mortal Share, The Killjoy and Devoid of Caring are my choices.

Wolverine - Still One of my favourite albums ever. I first heard Sleepy Town on a friend's shuffle, and wanted to know what the rest sounded like. I was amazed, and have been a fan of the band ever since. Sleepy Town itself is high on the list of favourite songs ever, too.

Sylosis - Edge Of The Earth As grandiose and epic as it is proggy as it is ear pummeling. I originally dismissed Sylosis as being too -core for my tastes based on looks alone. Big. Mistake. This album was one of the surprises of 2011 and still gets regular rotation on my commute. It's hard to pick favourite tracks because the whole album flows so well together, although Empyreal (both parts) deserve special mention.

Eluveitie - Slania Is it folk metal, or is it Gothenburg melodic death with a hurdy gurdy? I don't really know, but it's bloody good. I first heard of (and, indeed, heard) Eluveitie at Bloodstock '08. I rushed to the CD sales tent, only to discover that I had missed the rush and every copy of Slania had been sold in 30 minutes. Inis Mona is the definite highlight of this folk juggernaut.

Ghost Brigade - Isolation Songs I originally found out about Ghost Brigade from Last.fm, recommended due to my constant playing of Dark Tranquillity and Insomnium. I'm glad the recommendation engine worked this time! Possibly the most depressing death metal band I've ever heard. Highlights include Into The Black Light and Lost In A Loop.


I was also graciously allowed 5 "honourable mentions" for those albums that I love, but didn't make the top 10. To be honest this was harder to come up with than the first 10. There are so many albums I love  that narrowing it down proved difficult.

One in particular that gets regular plays is Skyforger by Amorphis. A random purchase at HMV led me to discover Amorphis, a sort of hybrid of melodic death and folk that's both heavy as a heavy thing and melodic as an, um, melodic ... thing. Aerolithe by Fall Of The Leafe (which led to the coining of the term "fotling", meaning "listening to Fall Of The Leafe") is another that I throw on a lot when I fancy something a bit more utterly nonsensical.

Perhaps a controversial choice because it is the least metal of anything I've put so far, but How To Measure A Planet by The Gathering is a long standing repeat listen. A fine work among a body of fine works. More recently, and definitely less controversially, is Woods of Ypres's final album Woods 5: Grey Skies And Electric Lights. Sure, it's depressing, but it's frankness and honesty elevates it from pointless morbidity into something far deeper and more philosophical.

And finally I can't forget to mention Monuments by Sheffield's own Northern Oak, the album I've seen played (in parts, at least) more than any other. If I fancy listening to it, I could put on the MP3s, or I could just pop to a local gig to enjoy it with an ale or five. 

Insomnium - One For Sorrow

You know it's a good year for metal when Insomnium release a new album. It's often said that the only people who don't like Insomnium are people who haven't heard Insomnium, and One For Sorrow doesn't seem set to change that any time soon.

Right from the off this is immediately recognisable as an Insomnium record, from the whispered, almost instrumental opening track to the heavy yet intricate melodies. Not wishing to rest on their laurels, while still maintaining their signature sound, there are some interesting additions.

The first, and most notable, variation is an interesting play on clean vocals in a death metal album. The clean vocals overlay the deep and resonating growls making for a menacing and certainly unsettling sound. This technique is used several times and always works well. The rest of the time the vocals are pure growl, as can be expected, nay, demanded from a band so firmly entrenched in the melodic death genre.

The other new thing is a purely instrumental track that seems to be the antithesis of Insomnium; Decoherence is so tranquil and gentle I have dozed off while listening to it, only to nearly jump out of my skin at the opening bars of Lay The Ghost To Rest.

The rest of the album is loosely based around One For Sorrow, a traditional rhyme steeped in superstition. The subject and lyrics of the rhyme vary from place to place, but it is always based around crows, magpies, jackdaws or blackbirds, the number of which tell the fortune of the beholder. The rhyme goes up to ten birds, and so there are ten tracks (well, eleven on the limited edition). Each one explores something new, although the link between the song and the matching line from the rhyme isn't always obvious.

It's almost impossible to be disappointed with this album. I'm sure some would have liked more progression, or at least more variety, but this album represents more a honing of a style than a departure from one. If you like Insomnium, you will like One For Sorrow. And if you don't, then you obviously haven't heard them yet.

Insomnium bless us with new music

In preparation for the release of their latest CD full of amazing awesomeness, Insomnium have seen fit to grace us with a free track from the new record. The new track, Unsung, is available from this link here.

It's definitely an Insomnium track. It sticks with the formula, but when the formula is this good, why mess with it? Go download it now.

Insomnium announce One For Sorrow

More details about the upcoming Insomnium album have been released by the band on insomnium.net for our perusal. The album will be titled One For Sorrow, after the magpie-counting rhyme. it will feature 10 tracks, one each for each line of the rhyme. Does that make it loosely fit the definition of a concept album? I'm not sure, but I'm sure it'll be awesome. From the band's website:

Guitarist Ville Friman comments on the album title, “The name One for Sorrow comes from a traditional children’s nursery rhyme. There are ten different scenarios in the original rhyme; likewise there are ten different songs and stories on our album. I think “One for Sorrow” truly depicts what this album is all about: bereavement, grief and loss.”

Release dates are split into three; 12th October in Finland, 17th October in the rest of Europe, and 18th October in North America. There is a little signup widget on insomnium.net to let you get news of pre-orders and the like. I'm sure I will be pre-ordering as soon as it's available.

There has, of course, also been a tour announced. Only one UK date, unfortunately, which means that chances are that we won't make it. 15th of November in London for anyone fortunate enough to make it! They're being supported (as you'll know if you read the poster above) by Before The Dawn, which makes the tour all the more bittersweet. I wonder if there's a way to travel 200 miles in half an hour yet?

2011 - A Year Of Metal

I suck. I've been far too busy holidaying in Prague to write anything for ages so here is my first attempt to put things right. 2011 is shaping up to be an great year for metal, and these four tasters and teasers should surely prove it.

Before The Dawn - Deathstar Rising

Out now, and available for a free listen on Spotify, this is Before The Dawn's 6th studio album, but their first on the mighty Nuclear Blast label. It's melodic death/gothic metal of the highest calibre, and it shall soon adorn my CD shelf.

Sanctorum - Semper Fidelis

I first discovered these guys when Zavvi, formerly Virgin Megastores, decided to offload a bunch of the band's first album, The Heavens Shall Burn, for three of your English quids. I bought it in jest, expecting something crappy, and instead discovered something awesome. Semper Fidelis is Sanctorum's third studio album, and I've already pre-ordered it. They're currently touring with My Ruin, but I'll be seeing them in Worksop on April 30th at the Frog & Nightgown for a freebie gig with Northern Oak.

Arch Enemy - Khaos Legions

I've not really known much about Arch Enemy before, and that has been very much my loss. 23inertia got into them when she was researching Angela Gossow for our sister blog, Femetalism, and liked it very much. It's melodic, it's death, it's growly and it's loud. Should be amazing, and out by early summer.

Insomnium - Untitled

What is there to say about this one? It's Insomnium. They're recording a new album. I can almost guarantee that it will blow your ears off with shear awesomilitude. Such is the band's dedication to high quality metal, they are having songwriting camps and training sessions to hone their skills. This will be spectacular.