Wake

A short-lived quartet, Wake released three recordings of which this self-titled demo was the first. Most tracks here are fairly short, averaging about 3 minutes in length, with the longest track at just over 4 minutes so the demo can be heard in one sitting. The music is melodic thrashy black metal with a strong sound, fairly clean but still with a sharp roughened edge, beefy bass rhythms and a thin screechy rasping vocal. The percussion is sharp and crisp, presenting a strong contrast to the dense swerving guitars.

Most songs are fast and aggressive in approach: they may begin and end quietly (so the album gives the impression of being a heaving organic entity) but the bulk of them is always full-on furious and extreme. The intensity and aggression are consistent across the entire recording so it's a matter of listener preference as to which tracks are the highlights. "The Draug" probably has the edge (only just, though) over the others in its sheer demented break-out runaway strings-n-stix battery; at just 3 minutes 30 seconds, it's over before listeners even register it's there (probably because it take 3 minutes at least to recover from being head-banged ... from the speakers). "Their Cries shall be Heard" is a hard crunchy song with thunderous guitar and drum work and reams of high-pitched screams soaring stratospherically overhead.

Some listeners might have a problem with the way the songs are structured: they're all linked by loose and quiet guitar tone scree from the previous tracks, and as tracks chop and change throughout with no clear riffs distinctive to them, they all come across as six balls of fury tied together. They have little identity of their own. When the whole recording is spent, the silence that follows is not only very sudden, it's deathly still; that may be an effect the band was striving for.

The musicianship is very good, given that the guys have to sustain energy and intense performance for over 21 minutes (and so have to pace themselves) at fast speeds. "Wake" is certainly well named: for 21 minutes, you're engulfed in a full radioactive heat blast that'll wake up every neuron in your brain. The message Wake (the band) brings is no less urgent: our planet is in danger of dying from destructive human activities and we must awake to our thoughtlessness and the consequences for our own survival of what we're doing.