Death is in the Air
It’s finally October which is my favorite month. My late fiance was born in October on the 15th. It’s also my favorite holiday and a great excuse to eat copious amounts of candy.
I’ll be doing some streams of Vampyr on twitch this month. I don’t really have a set schedule so you’ll have to follow me on twitter. Keebmouse is a pretty unique name. Odds are if you find a Keebmouse account it’s me.
Enough about me though let's look at this story’s band, Elegiac, and their newest album Vampiric Odinism. I searched for Black Metal after signing up for Band Camp. (Again I’m not sponsored by them or anything seriously check them out.) I basically went down the rabbit hole after finding Elegiac. Vampiric Odinism is a full-length album with 8 tracks. It’s black metal all the way down too.
Overall very good stuff here. I loved the first night I got this album. I fell asleep listening to it. That’s right I can fall asleep listening to black metal. This doesn’t make me special or anything. A lot of people use it as white noise when they go to sleep. My favorite album to sleep to is Filosofem by Burzum but we’re getting away from the actual review at this point.
The intro track of Vampiric Odinism, Draugadrottinn, is seriously creepy. I’ve had dreams where I was listening to music that was just creepy ambiance and disembodied voices that exude darkness. This track does a pretty good job of this. It makes you feel like a slasher flick villain is about to kill you. The name is actually very suiting of the track as Draugadrottinn is the name of the Lord of the Undead in Norse mythology.
Track number 2 “Northern Thunder” really hits hard right off the bat. Big wall of sound with a medium tempo blast beat. It doesn’t sound overproduced. It’s very raw. I have to say I love it when bands hit hard and heavy right off the bat. There’s something to be said for good build-ups. I know that, but there’s something to be said about that opening punch in the face too.
Then we have “Blood Religion” It’s a pretty nice track in that it’s more punk rock inspired. It is still dark but it has that steady punk rock groove to it. It’s a pretty long track clocking in at over 7 minutes. There are definitely thrash elements interwoven into everything. The break down that happens about 5 minutes in is slow and purposeful and includes some eerie chanting.
Finally, (I won’t review the entire thing track by track.) Let’s look at the title track “Vampiric Odinism” It’s a decent-sized track clocking in at just under 7 minutes. Reminds me of old Cradle of Filth a bit, but sans synth and definitely darker. I love chords that go a bit beyond standard punk rock affairs but it still harkens back to the old punk roots with little fills here and there. There are some nice blast beats at around the 4-minute mark. The thing I like most about black metal, that is not necessarily exclusive to it, is that the chords used are not just the “heaviest” They sound raw and evil. They’re usually higher pitched than most other metal sounds. They almost seem to bake the low end out of the guitar parts. I think this is why black metal sounds make for good white noise.
The purpose of this story is not to “shill” for Elegiac, or for Band Camp. I wouldn’t feel right though if I didn’t put in a link or two for them. I’m not sponsored or hired by neither the band nor the site. Have fun if you do choose to go there. Pick your favorite genre and just explore. There is tons of stuff waiting there to be discovered that you probably have never heard of. Historical facts and info are always provided via Wikipedia’s entries on the subjects. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you again really soon.
