...Over Old Hills

I’ve had this album for a couple years now… but now it’s on death row. Back in 2006 this was killer music; Bathory-esque pagan metal that’ll make folknuts from Europe dance in a circle. That scam is that the band is from Brazil, but that doesn’t stop them! For real though, this is a pretty decent attempt at folk metal with a pagan kick to it.

For a self-release, the band were helped primarily by session member Earth, who makes this album shine much more than it would have. Earth handles the deep cleans, bass guitar, and some guitars, which is more than the main members. His cleans are on the baroque-side, utilizing a ton of lower throat power and sounding incredibly majestic. They truly work with the second track, “Ode To The Braves,” but everywhere else I’m not too moved by them. The predominant vocal style is screams, but they’re more frail and weaker than the clean! Where the cleans sound proud and mighty, the screams are shallow and as menacing as a wet dog. I didn’t mind this back in 2006 / 2007, but I’m pissed that it took so long to realize how my pinky has more strength than them.

Instrumentally, this band has their arrangements down like cake-work, but their execution seems a little flawed. Production is very open and airy, but not atmospheric or able to alter the temperature. You don’t really feel like you’re in any sort of mood because it sounds so plastered and nimble. With say Bathory’s Hammerheart, the atmosphere was warm and you could feel the misty ocean air upon your steed as men set sail out on the horizon. It was an invigorating album, but this one’s just too processed with no real emotion. I blame this with the lack of funding and resources, not necessarily on the band, though. Still, it hampers the album like no other.

The instruments that really hurt from this are the guitars, which is pretty much tremolos buzzing for no apparent reason. I could take a guitar with cheap strings, plug it into an shitty amp, strum once and come up with a more hellish sound than them. They attempt to be melodic, but they don’t contribute as much as they think. That’s where the keys come in, which sound pretty rural but nice. They follow the lead and actually make up more of it than what the guitar tries to do.

“Home Of The Gods” has a decent guitar lead ending it, but the riffs oddly are the strong point like on “Ode To The Braves,” as they grumble and bark like mad (though still pretty tame). That’s another issue that I have – this album is way too tame for it’s own good. It wants to be a pagan metal album, but there are so many black metal characteristics that it comes off as a shy attempt at that. Bass I can’t really comment too much on because it doesn’t do anything except pop up from time to time following the riffs. It’s audible alongside the guitar pretty nicely, but that’s about all you can expect from it; grumbling on and on. Drumming is decent, though something tells me it might be a machine. The hits are rigid and the double bass is very quiet (I expected some clicks), but the mustiness of the entire kit is what kills it. The rhythms are dubiously mid-paced and nothing really comes out of them aside from that; it’s boring and repetitive as all hell, though.

No amount of magic and folk tunes can overturn this verdict. My decision is final, but I should have heard through the bullshit years ago. This is mediocre folk not because the songwriting generally sucks, but the execution is horrible and the songwriting only partially sucks. Props to these guys releasing this all by themselves, but I wish I talked them out of it.