Week 2: SpiRitual

   I still had several good options knocking around in my head when it came time for week 2, and the difficulty of deciding which to post about next was at least part of the reason why I'm doing this so late in the week. Anyway, after some thought I settled on SpiRitual. SpiRitual are a German group, and "they" are officially a solo project of Stefan Hertrich (formerly of Darkseed). A string of guest musicians appeared on the project's recordings, though, so it's not entirely accurate to think of this as a one man band.
   Hertrich formed SpiRitual in 2005 and promptly released the EP "Pulse". Later the full Pulse album was released, featuring the original 6 songs along with 2 new tracks. These 8 songs unfortunately comprise the entirety of SpiRitual's recorded work thus far.

   Before I go any further, I should point out that stylistically SpiRitual are kind of hard to place. They contain folk elements (primarily Middle Eastern and Native American), a good deal of electronic programming, ambient passages, a core of industrial metal, and occasional progressive guitar solos. The vocal styles employed are quite varied as well. For these reasons, I can only truly recommend this band and this album to people with fairly eclectic musical tastes.

The track list for the full album is as follows:
1. This Battle Is Yours
2. Symphony Of Life
3. Nahash
4. Pulse
5. Khundas
6. You Believe
7. Save And Heal
8. Nowhereness

   Many of the album's tracks start out soft with woodwind passages, dreamy female vocals, and/or mellow electronics. Some songs (Khundas and the closer Nowhereness) stay mellow throughout, but most tracks feature more aggressive elements after the initial intro passages. Once the drums drop and distorted guitars appear, the male vocals employed vary greatly, with a range that includes highly aggressive harsh vocals, clean baritone singing, distorted spoken passages, and coarse thrash metal yells. These changes occur many times in each song and are often layered and blended together along with drifting female vocals in the background. The music is constantly changing as well with appearances of by acoustic guitar, flutes, keyboards, sampling, piano, and occasional other instrumentation all scattered throughout nearly every song. As such, this isn't a band that can easily be understood by listening to a few short samples. For anybody curious but unwilling to track down the full album, though, the standout tracks are Symphony of Life and Pulse.

   So, for their extremely diverse and unique sound, SpiRitual are my metal band of the week.

Week 1: Introduction and first band, Dawn

   Hi everyone! Let me start off this very first post by saying why exactly I decided to start this blog. I've recently been reading Metallattorney's excellent blog, and I particularly enjoyed a feature he did where he picked out 10 underrated albums from each of 5 different subgenres of metal. After I read those, I found myself looking through my own music collection and telling myself repeatedly "more people should know about this band". So I decided to do something about it, however small that something may be. This blog is the result. Each week I intend to post a different band which, in my opinion, more people need to hear. These may be old, underrated bands or they may be brand new groups which just haven't had time to build a following yet. Any style of metal is game as well, provided it really is metal. Just to warn you, though, my tastes tend to center on Scandinavian death and black metal. Those will by no means be the only types of bands I cover, but don't be surprised to find a disproportionately large number of such bands discussed.

   Anyway, on to my inaugural selection! I had to give this one some serious consideration, and after a while I decided to go with Dawn. Dawn are not necessarily the band that inspired me to start this blog, but any time I think of underrated metal bands they inevitably come to mind. Dawn is a melodic black metal (or blackened death metal, depending on who you ask) band from Sweden. They formed in 1990, and after cutting a few demos they released their full length debut in 1994. This release, "Nær Sólen Gar Niþer For Evogher", is quite frankly one of the of the most underrated metal albums I've ever encountered. The sound inevitably invites comparisons with the work of Dissection, so if that's your style then this album is a highly recommended pick-up. The vocals are aggressive and once again, the best point of reference for tone here is Dissection. The drumming is highly proficient, and the guitar work is sharp yet enjoyably melodic. Unfortunately finding a physical copy for a realistic price is rather challenging, but if you can get your hands on this one it's a keeper.

   A split with Pyphomgertum followed, as well as the 1996 EP "Sorgh på Svarte Vingar Fløgh". The band's second full-length release, "Slaughtersun (Crown of the Triarchy)" came out in 1998, featuring somewhat longer songs than their debut, with all but one of the seven tracks clocking in at over eight minutes. Somewhat more polished sounding, for purists "Slaughtersun" perhaps falls somewhat short of its predecessor. Personally I've never been bothered by extreme metal bands having decent production values on their albums, so in my opinion this is a very strong album and I would definitely recommend it as well. The rawness of "Nær Sólen..." is lacking, but as black metal bands go Dawn is not what you would call terribly "raw" in the first place. The aggression levels are still plenty high though, and the overall quality of the musicianship is probably even better here than on the debut. Sadly, Dawn broke up after this release.

   Then, in 2007, Dawn reunited and rumblings of a new album emerged. "The Fourfold Furnace" was targeted for release in late 2008. However, finding any further information on this release has proven impossible for me. The band's website contains no updated information, and all my searches for the album have come up empty. Hopefully "The Fourfold Furnace" eventually sees the light of day, but in the mean time the band's existing discography, while tragically brief, is very strong.

   I should note that, rather unsurprisingly, members of Dawn have been part of other better known bands in Scandinavian metal. The highest profile of these appearances would be those of their vocalist and their drummer. Vocalist Henke Forss is probably best known for featuring on the early In Flames EP "Subterranean", their last recording before the acquisition of current vocalist Anders Friden. Dawn's drummer Tomas Asklund has appeared on Dark Funeral's "Vobiscum Satanas" as well as the late period Dissection recordings. In 2009's "Quantos Possunt ad Satanitatem Trahunt" he made his debut as part of the most recent incarnation of Gorgoroth. Perhaps this newest commitment lies at the root of Dawn's present inactivity, despite their formal reunion.

   So in conclusion, for their short-lived but excellent additions to the world of melodic Swedish black metal, Dawn is my very first metal band of the week.