It must have seemed like ‘the end of the world’ and indeed for many it was “as the generals left the game and only the wounded remained” (to quote another band). The folly and lunacy of the first world war is the bloody battlefield that we have been accustomed to, hiding in the trenches as Porta Nigra take us back to the front on their fourth full length album. Their brand of blackened metal along with the historical viewpoint it contains has always been an interesting one. Concentrating on the decadence of the time and the divide between the rich and distinguished vainglorious battle fervour of the commanders and the cannon fodder of the disposable commoners it veers on the avant-garde side of things, telling us a story along the way. As ever it is one that we have to rely on a certain knowledge to interpret as however it is presented, be it by spoken word parts, scathing vitriolic snarls or sweeping clean vocals it is all in its mother tongue and unless you are a fluent German speaker you will have no easy task when it comes to following the prose. Much of this we are told is attributed to the battlefield poetry of Georg Heym, Jakob van Hoddis, Georg Trakl, or Gottfried Benn so clues can be found to help along the way.
Time to put on the steel hat and hope not to be sniped or blown up in the first minute, let’s cautiously stick heads above parapets and join the melee. Gloomy guitar lines and ghostly spoken word are first to trick into a false sense of security before ‘Es Ist Krieg’ suddenly drops a hellacious battery of thudding blast-beats and everything literally goes to hell. Tempering things down a little with some atmospheric keyboard flowing along it’s a highly effective assault from founding members O and Gilles De Rais and they are also happy to add some snaking guitar leads to things rather than simply flatten the listener. Mind you with the strumming thrash laden tumult of Götterblut along with its harsh Teutonic rapid-fire vocal delivery hitting like a machine gun, they can do that admirably too. The furious barbed hooks of this one makes it a flesh-scouring track and a half. The propulsive thrust of Völkerbrand continues in a furious fashion and steamrollers over the muddy hell-scape like a tank. Eerie spoken word parts and the sort of clean croons that could have you thinking of Rammstein (perhaps a lazy comparison) give the track and indeed the album plenty of diversity. It’s not all out vehemence as tracks continue to flow, ‘Verlorene Paradiese’ for example finds sanctuary by concentrating on decadent melodicism and ‘Bestienschlund’ seems to convey a sense of loss and could be the soundtrack to where a short truce is declared as medics attend to the wounded and the dead are gathered.
Plenty of personality is here but the attention grabbing numbers are hard to ignore when they suddenly charge at full hilt like an armour plated Rhine-oceros, the pinch harmonic laden frenzy of ‘Die himmlische Revolution’ being a perfect example. The title track is a giddy ride with furiously spat out vocals and veers between whiplashing riffs and huge peaks of soaring grandiosity. It’s all perfectly composed even if it does leave you feeling a bit shell-shocked. However, there is no victory march of ceremony of jubilation as we finally survive at the armistice ‘Hora Mortis’ is left to reflect at the folly of death and remind that war is indeed hell. It may not be the perfect high-point to leave the album at but it is certainly an honest one.
As ever a fascinating album to delve into from Porta Nigra, a challenging yet unique act, well-worthy of checking out if you are looking for something that is both diverse and intelligent.
(8/10 Pete Woods)
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