11/02/02

HYMNS TO THE FALLEN IV / VARIOUS

Black Metal will probably never be totally acceptable to the mainstream audience, most people will never see past image and most Black Metal fans wouldn’t have it any other way. However no one who loves Metal can say that it’s boring, as this series of compilations has proven and volume 4 is pretty representative of most sub genre’s that exist and proves that Black Metal may sing a lot about the dead but it certainly isn’t dead itself.

The first 2 tracks by Thy Primordial kick it off to a fine start, with a tremendous mix of all that is good about Black Metal with some surprising melody, all be it guttural. Listening to this compilation it occurred to me that Black Metal and Folk music have a lot in common, subject matter, myths, legends and folk lore stories and both are rooted deep in the psyche of all of us although most will deny their darker side and as Sigmund said this will lead to problems in later life.

Hecate Enthroned put in a fine performance with "So Called Savior" and the Gothic tinged sound of Waylander is a joy to hear and my personal favorite tracks are by Skymining with "XTC" and "Solitude" with their Industrial tinged sound kind of like a Black Metal Nine Inch Nails. Imemorial and Eclipse also put in a fine performance and there are no bad tracks on this CD, if you don’t know much about this type of music why not explore something new and for only five pound, if you only like half of it you are quids in. Don’t buy that new Staind CD single, they don’t need the money and this is a much better investment.

TOTAL PLAYING TIME = 77 mins - 16 TRACKS