Olm og bitter

The temporary hiatus of the Norwegian band Khold had several consequences, including the creation of Sarke, and the final resurrection of Tulus, already briefly brought back to life a few years ago with Biography Obscene (2007). This Norwegian group made its mark in the 1990s with three albums featuring a melodic black metal heavily tinged with gothicism, but was put on hold a first time in early 2000s, when Blodstrup (aka. Gard) launched Khold. So, what to expect from Olm og Bitter (2012), the first release of Tulus in five years?

First, a word on the ugly cover, reminiscent of the horrors displayed on the 1990s albums, rather than the beautiful illustration used for Biography Obscene. I can not believe that group members were able to endorse this result, which gives a very bad first impression. But let's focus instead on the music. The songs are short (three minutes on average) written in a style that evokes quite clearly the other projects from this Oslo trio. We are in familiar territory. It starts smoothly from the opening track, Fornemmelse, which installs many tags of the album: it will be fast enough, dotted with thrash and hard rock riffs, accompanied by the inimitable gravelly voice of Blodstrup. The first songs unfold with the same structure alternating blasts with slower parts, except Draugtatt, more mid-tempo. Note the short ambient interlude Nidhevn, which breaks the rhythm of the album and should have normally been put in the intro. The latest songs return to the original formula, without one of them clearly standing out. While not bad, they are perhaps a little too bland. Curiously, which cling most about this album is its acoustic finale, which occupies the last minute of Labyrinth, and offers a moment of poetry before the close. This is an idea to dig for the future.

Olm og Bitter may well be the sixth Khold or the third Sarke album, and no one would notice. This album is missing an identity. It’s more of a compromise between musicians busy with other projects. This is, ultimately, the kind of record that takes the dust once listened a few times. 6/10

Originally written for metalobscur.com

"Olm og Bitter" is the fifth full-length studio album by Norwegian black metal trio, Tulus. It's been awaited by many fans for a half of a decade and the expectations were really high. The previous album, "Biography Obscene", was a remarkable blend of unorthodox musical ideas and supreme musicianship, so needless to say, such a long period of silence could mean a thorough creation of a new masterpiece. The new Tulus album has already arrived and could I say that it's as good or even better than the previous one? Rather not.

As we all know, in the early 2000's the musicians of Tulus formed another well-known project, Khold. While the music of Tulus was definitely closer to mainstream black metal of the mid-nineties, Khold represents a rather groovier and slower approach to the genre. The parallel co-existence of two bands shows the musicians' wish to have two separate projects to implement different musical ideas instead of experimenting with one band's style. And this worked, although we all knew about the same people behind the names Tulus and Khold , we also knew that both bands sounded quite different. The biggest problem after the release of Olm og Bitter is that this is not the case anymore. The style and sound of Tulus got too much "Kholdized".

The production always used to be a strong side of all Tulus albums, and Olm og Bitter ain't no exception. The sound is powerful and groovy, yet clean and well-balanced, but if I had heard this album without knowing the band, I would surely have said that Khold had recorded the fastest album so far. That's it. There are very few things that remind me the typical Tulus sound. The female vocals are gone as is the violin and the keyboards. The wonderfully "gurgling" bass sound is less present, although the bass itself is audible. And the most important thing, Blodstrup's vocals are almost identical to his performance on Khold's "Hundre År Gammal".

In terms of songwriting, we wouldn't find anything extravagant or innovating here, so this album couldn't match "Biography Obscene". The riffs are quite simple and generic, and most songs are fast and punchy, but lack a proper development. Somehow most of them seem to be too short and inconclusive. Generally speaking, this is quite a solid black metal release, but unfortunately, it fails where Tulus once used to be great. No more weird instrumentals, no unpredictable tempo changes, and no melodic riffs. One might say that Tulus sounded quite eclectic on their previous release, but I hope everyone would agree that it was a part of its twisted beauty. "Olm og Bitter" is a speedy and aggressive album, but it's also crippled by lack of original ideas.

What would I like to say with this review? This album is not bad by any means, but if we set the earlier releases of Tulus as a judging criteria, this is definitely a step back. The influence of Khold is very obvious here and although I also like this band and don't consider their style inferior to Tulus, I would say that "Olm og Bitter" sounds as a compilation of unreleased songs by Khold. And after five years of waiting for a new Tulus album, this feels quite disappointing.