Swordmaster
Postmortem Tales
[Osmose]
Let's go back 2 (hmm maybe even 3) or so years now when Swordmaster's "Wrath's of Time" mCD came out
on Full Moon Productions. I remember taking the CD out of the mail, tossing it into
the CD player and listening to it about 4000 times. "Wrath's of Time" was, and still is
one of the better recordings I have ever heard. Drums were amazing, cool atmospheric
riffs were all over the place, and the vocals were *so* fucking tight. So it wasn't
strange that I wasted a few years of my life anticipating the new full length with
extreme lust. For some reason though, these guys kept delaying it's release...first
they changed studios, then moved labels, and then most likely sat around and picked their
arses for about six months. But a few weeks ago it finally came out, and I was as happy
as a person could possibly be to hear that. Well...here's my verdict:
Listening to this CD for the first time I said to myself "Wow, this sure is a good Destruction disc".... yet I quickly realized that I was listening to the new Swordmaster CD...tears followed that amazing discovery. Yes, along with dozens of other bands, Swordmaster have hopped the "Neo-Thrash" bandwagon, and although been somewhat successful at what they are doing, IT'S NOT WHAT I WANTED TO HEAR. Why??? Why do bands like Swordmaster and Dodheimsgard, groups who had *excellent* first discs, find it necessary to try and re-live what their childhood heroes already successfully attained musically (Why can't a shit band like C.O.F do it?)? And not only has the music here changed, but so have the vocals. For those of us who liked "Wraths of Time" you'll most likely remember the excellent, tight vocals. Not here though. Although blackened, nothing is pushed like on the mCD it seems, the vocals are boring, generic, and for the most part quite pathetic. Drums aren't as good either (well, most likely because this is a new drummer, Inferno joined Dissection I believe), they are good, but not as good. And damn the band for allowing new drummer Nicky Terror (of Deathwith/Sacramentum uggh..) to write all the new music and basically ruin the band. The band have also changed their image. No more evil poses and corpse paint, but beer, tongues stuck out all over the place, and middle fingers everywhere! Remember the back of "Wraths of Time" where Whiplasher had his middle fingers stuck up? Well thanks to a nice collection of pictures throughout the packaging (lot's of them) we get to see the band in 30+ poses with middle finger's stuck up in most of them-yes ladies and gentlemen, a new genre of black metal has now arrived..."Middle Finger Black Metal". I'm not sure what is worse here, how disappointed I am, or how I wasted time actually been excited about this release. Oh well, the full version of "Conspiracy..." (now called Claws of Death) is nice I suppose, production is excellent, but besides that: FUCK YOU SWORDMASTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!
© 1997 brand
Listening to this CD for the first time I said to myself "Wow, this sure is a good Destruction disc".... yet I quickly realized that I was listening to the new Swordmaster CD...tears followed that amazing discovery. Yes, along with dozens of other bands, Swordmaster have hopped the "Neo-Thrash" bandwagon, and although been somewhat successful at what they are doing, IT'S NOT WHAT I WANTED TO HEAR. Why??? Why do bands like Swordmaster and Dodheimsgard, groups who had *excellent* first discs, find it necessary to try and re-live what their childhood heroes already successfully attained musically (Why can't a shit band like C.O.F do it?)? And not only has the music here changed, but so have the vocals. For those of us who liked "Wraths of Time" you'll most likely remember the excellent, tight vocals. Not here though. Although blackened, nothing is pushed like on the mCD it seems, the vocals are boring, generic, and for the most part quite pathetic. Drums aren't as good either (well, most likely because this is a new drummer, Inferno joined Dissection I believe), they are good, but not as good. And damn the band for allowing new drummer Nicky Terror (of Deathwith/Sacramentum uggh..) to write all the new music and basically ruin the band. The band have also changed their image. No more evil poses and corpse paint, but beer, tongues stuck out all over the place, and middle fingers everywhere! Remember the back of "Wraths of Time" where Whiplasher had his middle fingers stuck up? Well thanks to a nice collection of pictures throughout the packaging (lot's of them) we get to see the band in 30+ poses with middle finger's stuck up in most of them-yes ladies and gentlemen, a new genre of black metal has now arrived..."Middle Finger Black Metal". I'm not sure what is worse here, how disappointed I am, or how I wasted time actually been excited about this release. Oh well, the full version of "Conspiracy..." (now called Claws of Death) is nice I suppose, production is excellent, but besides that: FUCK YOU SWORDMASTER!!!!!!!!!!!!!
© 1997 brand