Мертві сорому не ймуть

I've been a fan of Dub Buk ever since I came across their second album and thus I've always tried to keep up with any news of future recordings. This new release, which I'll just shorthand as "Mertvi..." for now, has been labelled as an upcoming album since 2005! I wonder what took so long? In 2010, the wait finally ended and there was finally some new Dub Buk material. I jumped on it immediately.

Upon hearing the first few minutes of the first track, Batko Klyatv, I was relieved to hear this was the Dub Buk I was used. Those signature vocals were recognizable immediately and the riffs were solid enough to be enjoyed, keeping somewhat of a militant style many other Dub Buk songs are known for. The music was accompanied by keyboards and some flutes like I remembered from the old days. The same thing can be said about the second and fourth track.

The best tracks are probably Sojalnie Greh and Stin Stepey. Sojalnie Greh is a very thrashy piece likely to be found on their last album; nothing too out of the ordinary here, but it's fast and the riffs change frequently, making it a fun listen for most Dub Buk fans. The latter song takes a little while to kick in, but when it does, the lead guitar and rhythm mix very well which actually put me in a tance-like state of mind when I first heard it. It's hard to explain - you just have to hear for yourself. It's something epic but from a slightly different interpretation.

The main problem I had with this album was a lack of creativity in some songs. The third track "Sverceholveku Moral ne Nujna" is incredibly laggy and boring. Yeah, it's slower than the rest, but the main problem is how similar, yet inferior it sounds to the following track. Where the latter is more catchy and versatile, very little happens in the former. You keep thinking something big will happen, but it remains in some stasis the entire time, being one of the bigger disappointments of the album. This is actually the same kind of problem with the final track - it's a boring outro instrumental that borrows the exact same riffs as the beginning of Stin Stepey. You want it build up more or provide some atmosphere, but it never delivers.

Another problem is that while most of the songs are decent, they all lack a certain type of punch that older Dub Buk albums were known for. The songs are kind of just there, with nothing too much to offer making them not too memorable. It's almost like they were being too conservative with the song writing; they didn't want to try too many things out of the ordinary, which other bands like Nokturnal Mortum and Kroda are well known for doing. There are minor keyboard interludes, but they come in arbitrarily and don't last long enough to make a lasting impression. Another idea would have been for them to play around with those techno-like beats that were prevalent in their previous album, Rus Ponad Vse!. I recall the band doing a live cover of Burzum's Jesus' Tod, where the introduction was entirely techno. Why not put that on the album? Maybe it would have freaked a lot of people out, but it would've been damned interesting and made this album a bit more memorable.

"Mertvi soromu ne imut" is a decent album overall. None of the songs are bad by any means, and the better ones are still great, but I feel like the band is capable of doing a lot more based on their previous releases. They have great potential, but you won't find much of it here unfortunately. If they can get out of their comfort zones and take more risks in their song writing, the quality of their future releases should very high.

If you were ever curious about Dub Buk, this would be the album to start with. You don't really notice the flaws until you've heard Dub Buk's earlier releases. Also, if you're unfamiliar with Ukrainian metal, this would also be a good start in that context.