Tetlapohualiztli in Tonatiuh

There is a lot of cool, indigenous-inspired black metal coming out of Latin America these days, and with a cover like that I couldn't help checking it out. Unfortunately it doesn't live up to its artwork.

The first half, by Mexican Eunoë, shows a lot of musical promise if you can get over the vocals.

The guitars are fairly clearly produced, and they use a pan flute along with it to create a nice folk metal jam. Riffs are repetitive like most black metal is but it's kind of hypnotic with the flute playing along. Bass is actually clear and adds a bop to the music, one of the first underground bands with a bass I can actually hear. On the second track it's absolutely aggressive.

There's a lot of sound effects - wind, water, birds - and also some synth, both of which are normal in folk metal. There's nothing mind-blowingly original here, but it's still enjoyable. There's tempo-changes, breakdowns, and overall musical progression. They use acoustic guitars, a mouth harp, rain sticks - there's more than just the pan flute for traditional instruments here.

The 'sore thumb' that sticks out is the vocalist (or vocalists.) I can't really tell if it's one guy with a range or two different people. Either way, the majority of the album the vocalist is doing a strained-voice shout that sounds a lot like Tlateotocani (or Kristallnacht, which is where I think they got it from). He doesn't sound very good, even on repeated listens I'm having trouble adjusting to it. He's singing in Nahuatl which is really cool, but, it just doesn't sound good. Then other times he (or the other person) will attempt high pitched shrieks but it's whisper-screamed and sounds like a monkey. Totally ruins the vibe and takes you out of the music.

So overall I'm interested in this band's future material, I think musically it's pretty good, playing is good, production is good, indigenous instruments are used well, but they have to do something about the vocals.

The second half, by Salvadoran Ancestrus is complete trash. I thought "this sounds a lot like 1932 (from the same country)"... well, it's the same members. So you have the same kind of thing: mindlessly simple riffs that aren't interesting at all, random banging drums that don't like up with the music, and breathy vocals like he's blowing or inhaling on the microphone. The drums are at least comprehensible instead of so raw and fuzzy it's just static noise, but like I said they're out of line with the riffs so they're still an annoyance. The sort of "windy" vocals can be cool if done well, like Aurvandil or Orgy of Carrion, but here it's just annoying.

The difference between 1932 and Ancestrus is that Ancestrus introduces a pan flute. While Eunoë uses the pan flute in a way that matches with the music and works like any other folk metal this is uh... just random notes on top of the metal music which is already mostly random notes.

Final rating on this split: 70/100 for Eunoë, 0/100 for Ancestrus.