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Death Metal Album of the Week: Sentenced – North from Here

On the 93rd (number of the Thelemic Law) anniversary of the independence of Finland from the Russian Empire, let the northern lights flash their yearning flames beckoning the souls of the fallen warriors of the Civil War. While it may seem to some as a sacrilege to play anything but the Romantic sylvan mystery plays of Sibelius, the true heir of Wagner and one of Finland’s national composers, the early death metal symphonies of Oulu’s Sentenced epitomize a great deal of the same thundering natural melancholy. Following the youthful, reaping, Dismember-esque debut album “Shadows of the Past”, the musical theory of Jarva, Lopakka and Tenkula turned like the Roman mythical Janus statue two ways at once: towards the pure riffcraft of Iron Maiden and the ethereal, streaming melody of Nordic black metal. Much like At the Gates had captured nearly protestant-religious passion and sadness in Sweden, Sentenced managed to concoct music which was worshipful, raging, realistic (even pessimistic) and imaginative all at once, in defiance of the taciturn apathy characteristic (like alcohol) of the working class of northern Finland. In Sentenced, the pent-up rage of skeptical and prematurely cynical young men was transformed into elaborate poetic reflection.

Power metal riffs in a death metal production would later experience a horrible mangled mutilation death in Children of Bodom’s excessive rock stage theatrics, but the sharp minds of Sentenced treated their source material with such profound affection that heavy metal, thrash, death metal and black metal weave into each other as interminable patterns of tangled paths amidst hypercosmos – a Northern Finnish shaman’s spell. The careful production recalls the most biting moments of Kreator while the technical skills of the guitarists are on par with the hallowed “prog” moments of Atheist and Death. The songs hardly suffer from any useless repetition (the anthemic verse-chorus structure of “Awaiting the Winter Frost” serves a specific purpose in exclaiming the satirical “heavy metal victory” over the forces of light, while it is deliberately obscured whether the narrator is a man, a beast or a spirit). That “North from Here” was never Sentenced’s most popular or esteemed moment is a total wrongness, as “Amok” followed on the footsteps of this work adequately, but only that. One of the strongest candidates for the best Death Metal album in the history of Finland, the bewitching maledictions of “North from Here”, from “Capture of Fire” to “Beyond the Wall of Sleep” (and practically any piece since there is no filler), achieved the aims of “Gothenburg” much more effectively and impudently than the horde’s western neighbours.

Obscura – Cosmogenesis / Kalisia – Cybion

“Progressive” death metal is probably the most difficult death metal subgenre to do anything interesting in, because for the most part it is mainstream metal given the spin with dynamic production, aesthetic variation and all kinds of pointless superimposed elements, giving only rehashes of the popular substyles of death metal. It does not come as a surprise that on the new album “Cosmogenesis”, Obscura blends very well into the bland mainstream oriented current of Gothenburg (esp. Dark Tranquillity) and tech-death (esp. Atheist) influences. While apparently taking their name from a perennial Gorguts favorite, this neo-progressive metal opera only hints at the beautiful quasi-random soulseeking of Alf Svensson’s space-themed Oxiplegatz project and fails to unite all the various tendencies and instrumental parts into a descriptive work: the acoustic guitars, the Cynic-esque clean vocals, the fusion guitar heroics and even the modern grindcore reminiscent of Nile comes and goes at will but fails to instate lasting effect because the structure is uninvolving. Who anyway thought that it’s a good idea to combine Cynic’s “Focus” with metalcore standards and “catchy” lead guitar? It’s the most anal “heavy” music in 2009 but, hey, it will get 10000% in Metal-Archives because the majority are suckers for this! I like to think that these guys are very good jazz musicians but for metal, sorry, unable to capture the intensity and genius of the originators of the death metal genre.

Resembling a ten times more cheesy Nocturnus, Kalisia utilizes mainstream metal production values to hybridize progressive space metal with Arch Enemy school death/thrash. It contains some astonishingly bad sequences, like those belonging to vapid jazz musicians attempting death metal, especially when the solos scream conservatory trained pop musician virtuoso. Think of the latest Cynic album and make it more commercial and add booming synths and easy listening female vocals. In a weaker approximation of the massive sagas of Oxiplegatz and Bal-Sagoth, Kalisia goes for pure theatre of the macabre, a narrative science fiction tale of soundtrack cliches, processed voices and ADHD mix of influences as if doing something new, but wimpy and non-challenging. Death metal can lend itself beautifully to science fiction operas (think of Nocturnus or SUP) but it works only when suggestive use of texture can build an alien landscape – this kind of shrill, digital and annoying pop-influenced soundscape is closer to Nightwish than real death metal. The wanking and the various processes make Kalisia sound flashy and hysterical, rooted in a human personality. It has too much safe music for people who do not dare to truly break out and dream of the Otherworld. The professional musicianship may satisfy a fan of mainstream metal, but there’s very little sparkling innovation, unique spirit or brutal force to make an underground metal fan’s passion ignite.

Swedish Death Metal compilation

“On occasion of the release of the German edition of Daniel Ekeroth’s groundbreaking masterpiece book “Swedish Death Metal”, a homonymous 3-CD compilation will be released featuring more than 50 relevant tracks amounting to a playing time of over 200 minutes. Apart from essential classics of the genre, this audio companion will contain many rare recordings and insiders’ tips from the heyday of the Swedish Death Metal scene: CD1 starts off with the pioneers of Swedish Death Metal and documents the genesis of the entire genre. CD2 focusses on the period of the first album releases of the scene, which spread the deadly Swedish sound all over the globe. It naturally portrays the classics of the Stockholm school (Entombed, Dismember…), but also the beginnings of a more mid-tempo and atmosphere orientated variation of the original style (Tiamat, Therion…). It contains early documents of the Gothenburg sound (At The Gates, Liers In Wait) as well as the fusion of Death Metal and the emerging Black Metal (Marduk, Dissection). CD3 eventually overviews the variety and power of Swedish Death Metal in its golden age and draws a bow into the present with a strong newcomer act like Katalysator.

CD3
Evocation / Through the darkened peril / 1992 Demo / The Ancient Gate demo 92
Seance / Reincarnage / 1991 Demo / Levitised Spirit Demo 91
Toxaemia / Beyond The Realm / 1990 EP / Toxaemia EP 90
Furbowl / Shark Heaven / 1991 Demo / The Nightfall Of Your Heart Demo 91
Suffer / Human Flesh / 1991 Demo / Manifestation of God Demo 91
Traumatic / A Perfect Night to Masturbate / 1991 Demo / A Perfect Night to Masturbate Demo 91
Macrodex / Necrophilicide / 1990 Demo / Remains Of A Lost Life Demo 90
House Of Usher / Rather Black / 1991 EP / On The Very Verge 7″ 91
Crypt Of Kerberos / The Ancient War / 1992 EP / Cyclone of Insanity EP 92
Eternal Darkness / Psychopath / 1992 EP / Doomed 7″ 92
Interment / Morbid Death / 1991 Demo / Where Death Will Increase Demo 91
Uncanny / Transportation To The Uncanny / 1991 Demo / Transportation To The Uncanny Demo 91
Sadistic Gang Rape / Die in Agonie / 1992 Demo / Massdevastation Demo 92
Sarcasm / In Hate / 1992 Demo / In Hate… Demo 92
Crematory / Enshrouded (in the River of Eternity) / 1992 Demo / Netherworlds Of The Mind Demo 92
Necrony / Under the Black Soil / 1993 Promo / Promo Tape 93/94
Repugnant / Spawn of Pure Malevolence / 1998 Demo / Spawn of Pure Malevolence Demo 98
Katalysator / Mass Genocide Ritual / 2007 Demo / Mass Genocide Ritual 07″

It’s a sad fact that very little worthwhile historical and analytical literature about metal has been published, while even pop and soft rock get academical musicological treatments in review journals. One of the few volumes to correct the situation was Daniel Ekeroth’s massive Swedish Death Metal which gives the most authentic glimpse to the world of early death metal since the zines of the era. The book is widely available at Amazon and other places and every death metal fanatic should definitely get themselves a copy. Also the compilation mentioned above should be available all over the netstores in the next few days. Especially CD’s 1 and 3 seem interesting, with all those demo obscurities, and luckily he didn’t put any Opeth and the like on the compilation! He also selected a very impressive Therion track.

Interview with Daniel Ekeroth

Sentenced guitarist dead at 34

Sentenced guitarist Miika Tenkula, conjurer of Finnish death metal tours de force in the early 90′s before the band mutated into gothic hard rock, has passed away in his home at Muhos on 19th of February. Another death through alcohol exhibits the symptoms of sickness, decadence and depression caused by the lack of a sense of purpose in modern society.

Mourn his passing by spinning some of the classic songs from their masterpiece “North from Here”.

Clips
Sentenced – My Sky Is Darker Than Thine (clip)

Reviews
Shadows of the Past
Shadows of the Past
North from Here
North from Here
The Trooper
Amok