Ah, another ‘band I’ve been aware of but not really engaged with’ time. Fear and Trembling (so says Google) and apparently pagan black metal. My experience of Trollzorn bands is that they dont tend to sign yer actual bestial bm style and often have a kind of folky/Viking tinge so curiosity is added to the mix.
‘Mirrors And Smoke’ opens with a slow, doomy, almost old Katatonia sound and a mournful melody rising from it. Harsh but clear vocals. The drumming picks up the momentum and we crash into ‘Voices From The Coffin’. This is actually a pretty full-on slab of melodic black metal that delves into a kind of melancholy early pagan metal vibe. Midway-ish it kind of drops into a slower, doomy section before finding its way back. Not a bad start if maybe a little overlong for the content.
‘A Hundred Days Of Rain’ finds a more pagan/doom feel from the outset, kind of early Paradise Lost feel seeping in around the vocal rhythms and guitar hooks. Clean vocals bring the doom heavily into play and in all its a fine track indeed, full of melancholy. ‘King Of The Lost’ follows in a similar vein before picking up the tempo. Again the lilting melody brings to mind the more pagan/Viking style and the nicely varied and impassioned vocals simply accentuate that. The mid-section again though drops the gear and seems to merely extend the length than entirely knit the thing together despite some fine clean singing. ‘Of Wolf And Sun’ has that mid pace gothic, doomy feel to it with those Viking metal melodies before stretching out into the more downbeat side of some Amon Amarth style musing. With more straightforward tempo shifts and no long midsection this works so much better for me.
‘Catharsis’ weighs in at as good as nine minutes and is pretty much doom/death in style. It’s pretty good and very classy as is all the album just it fails to snag me as tightly as it should I’m afraid.
‘A Crown Of Bones’. Full tilt bm style drums but that almost lazy, slow melody to the bm vocals. This is deeply atmospheric and with an almost Viking metal sway to the song even as a gothic cloak surrounds it. Some clean vocals just add another doomy, gothic layer to it. Nice. Closer ‘Bearer Of The Accursed Sands’ pretty much follows the template of the album; melancholy doomy pagan metal with some truly great vocal melodies that remind me of Mael Mordha.
All in all Timor Et Tremor certainly have class and a real style. The vocals, whether clean or harsh, are exemplary and the melodies evoke real reflection and melancholy. I do have issues with the length of some songs, particularly the ones I note with a midsection that for me just seemed to serve little purpose and two or three songs are very similar.
I know that sounds harah but that’s probably because what I like here is excellent and I also think many will disagree. So if you like melodic doom/death with a gothic flourish and pagan metal soul this is certainly worth your time considering.
(7/10 Gizmo)
Leave a Reply