Son of the Morning

When Dimmu Borgir, Cradle of Filth and Bal Sagoth were releasing there debut records almost 20 years ago, the term symphonic black metal was starting to spread throughout the underground. Combining guitars, bass, drums, keyboards and violins into one song was refreshing and innovative. By the late 1990’s early 2000’s, symphonic black metal was a bloated, pompous, overly produced mess. Elderblood’s debut album Son of the Morning combines the mid 1990’s symphonic sound with the brutality of today’s black metal scene.

Gates to Oblivion is a 45 second intro that goes into a superhuman track called Dies Irae. This track smokes! Throughout the song there is a great infectious riff that reminds me of Slayer’s Seasons in the Abyss album. Plenty of keyboards that form a feeling of doom and blasphemy. Elderblood come off the strongest when the tempo’s are slower. One example is the song My Death. I was blown away how Astargh, Odalv and Hagalth arrange these beautiful, dark melodic melodies. Around the 2.00 minute mark there is a piano part that’s haunting and atmospheric. The track reminded me of an orchestra performing with a metal band in the background. The Xi--Th Angle reminded me of The Gathering and Crematory. Heavy on the gothic, doom-death keyboards circa 1992. Also you will find a guitar solo on this track. You appreciate this, since the whole record is keyboard fueled. The song Naglfar ventures into some very fast black metal combined with keyboard parts that have a sinister carnival vibe. Early Arcturus comes to mind. Astargh also uses the keyboards to create spacey, ambient pieces that gives the song Egocide a completely different sound then the rest of the record. When the song Re-Birth came on my first impression was that this could become the future of Elderblood. There were some clean vocals on this track. A great contrast from the rest of the album. This made me realize that the band can venture into many other genre’s of metal.

Astargh and Odalv are former members of the mighty Nokturnal Mortum. Elderblood keeps there distance from sounding like a clone to the above-mentioned band. The creativity and brilliance in the song writing would make anyone believe that this is the bands third or fourth record. The production is solid. Listening to this with your headphones on will give you a greater appreciation for Elderblood.

The only downfall I have with the record is that the vocals at times smother parts of the songs. Astargh has a very harsh vocal approach and creating symphonic metal there should be a limit to the vocal delivery.

To describe Son of the Morning would be grand, wicked, cataclysmal and fiendish.