Seemingly a fairly new label from Poland, Ossuary Records previously sent the melodic metal of Divine Weep our way. This time around things are slightly darker with the recently reviewed Okrutnik and Kira coming to assault our ears. The Polish underground is a thriving one and there are no shortage of home-grown bands bustling to be heard so hopefully this label are going to be able to give more of them a voice. Kira were formed in 2015 and comprise of members of bands such as Nomad, Deathstorm, Ethelyn and Skullthrone. This is their second album following up from 2017 Ancient Lies. Having not heard that though, this is where it starts for us.
Flinging open the Gates Of Hell literally with an atmospheric 20 seconds of hellish noise, riffs squeal and a blackened thrashing tumult piles out the speakers as they romp into Lucifer’s Herald. It’s headbanging stuff and has plenty of chops about it, the vocals craggy and rough with some neat harmonious guitar leads forging the melody. It’s a pretty-standard banger and an enjoyable statement of intent to the start of the album. There’s some odd sounds in it as well that caught me off guard and showed that this may not be a completely conventional ride throughout. ‘One Gram Of Your Soul’ follows and is a fair bit longer taking on a slower and more funereal approach. It’s an odd adjustment for anyone thinking this album was going to be a full on rager and brings some classical and gothic tones to the blackness. I particularly found the vocals attributed to Hellishdust here intriguing being sinisterly craggy whispers very much in flavour of the music’s tomblike solemnity. It does seem like this could be the work of two different bands so far and its obvious Kira are going to keep us on our toes here as they forge further devilish impressions.
We are back to shorter sharper shockers like the gabbling demonic chanting ‘Necroscience’ next. It has plenty of life in it even if it seems this is caused by experimenting with the dead. It also has some melodic guitar weaving which again sets it out as being anything but normal and formulaic. There’s even a bit of Voivod to this and when the next track ‘Temple Of Suffering’ clanks into life it appears that the dead are now shambling and the experiments have gone awry perhaps in a cataclysmic Return Of The Living Dead 3 style. Musically though it seems the band have constructed an album of both fast and correspondingly slow songs here; the good news is that they appear adept at both and keep things interesting for the listener. This cemetery stalker is a definite highlight. The slower tempos over it and Lord Of Hallucinations bring an air of creepy malevolence to the ghastly table and put things more firmly in the black metal camp and bring atmosphere in a fashion of bands such as Mortuary Drape and the eternal darkness of Demoncy. The next surge is never too far away though and the marriage of thrashing fury and malignancy is there to up the tempo on songs like ‘In The Devil’s Embrace where the guitars of Nameless and Cannibal are allowed to both scythe and bring an air of gothic grandiosity to things. The thrash origins obviously are strongly saluted here by a closing cover of Sodom’s ‘Silence Is Consent’ finishing off an album that has been an enjoyable and varied listening experience. Apparently, the band are already working on a follow up and promise more fire and sulphur, I look forward to it.
(7.5/10 Pete Woods)
Leave a Reply