Videoclip of the Month!!!

Friday, September 23, 2011

Marduk - Iron Dawn

Marduk - Iron Dawn


Marduk is a one of the oldest black metal bands to come out of Sweden. Anyone who has been through their discography knows that Marduk is one of the most brutal black metal bands ever to hit the scene. They were known for their killer blast beats and speed and pace of their music as well as the World War II themes in their music and there wasn’t a band that could come close to these guys. This was during the era where Legion took care of the vocals, but when he left, everything just turned a little weird. The music had to change to suit Marduk’s new vocalist, and this was probably the first time when Marduk started to go downhill and the worst thing is that things didn’t get any better. Out of Marduk’s entire discography, their last album Wormwood had to be the weirdest of them all, the vocals and musical structure was abrasive but kept together nicely. But now, they have just turned so weird.

If people though that Wormwood was a little weirder than everything else they have put out onto the scene you haven’t heard this ep yet. Literally everything about Marduk has just gotten so weird and things changed quite a lot since Wormwood. As much as fans hate for me to say it but it was for the worse, not for the better. But I guess line up changes are unavoidable so I commend them for trying to hold things together but the fact is that it doesn’t make their music any better. I think the weirdest part of their new sound is definitely the vocals, I don’t understand why anyone (and I mean anyone) would try and sing like this. Just imagine a 90 year old black metal vocalist trying to rap his lyrics, the number of people who would say “oh, I caaaan’t image that”, well you don’t have to, because it’s right here in this album. I think that the vocals have literally killed their sound beyond repair. It has made everything else in their music not worth listening to because it is that bad. I feel sort of sorry for the rest of the band members though because all of their hard work is being blocked by terrible vocals.

For some reason, the music is terribly loose now because before, their albums were technical masterpieces. It seems that they have tried to go way too fast and too hard than they can handle. As a result of this, it seems like the whole infrastructure of their music has just collapsed in on itself, just leaving this pile of rubble. I honestly think that there were absolutely no beats that were in time on this whole 3 track ep, from the drumming to the guitar work…nothing, not even in the dead slow parts.

But, like every veteran band out there, they still have kept some of their key traits. The first one to mention is obviously the blast beats. Thank god the blast beats are still here because if they weren’t you know something is terribly wrong with these guys. The drumming is still going at 100kmph but even they have problems that kind of wreck the music. The first problem or change for the worse they have is the tone of the drums. The drumming back in Panzer Division Marduk were killer because of the speed and tone. Now the speed is still there but the tone isn’t, it just seems like it doesn’t have the same impact as before. The second thing is that the drumming isn’t consistent. Now I’m not exactly sure if this was an attempt to try and get some variety going throughout their music or what, but I think it just wrecks the whole purpose and feeling of the blast beats which defeats the purpose of them in the first place.  Well at least its fast, isn’t it?

Its releases like this that makes people not want to listen to bands any longer. Yeah I think Marduk has had a tremendous run creating some of the most brutal black metal money could buy and some memories of some of the best black metal I’ve ever heard. Now I’m not making any predictions that are set in stone but I just can’t see them gaining a larger fan base if they keep making music like this. Their music is loose and untidy and all the components of their music have just gone belly up, this is not something I want to hear. Although they are heading downhill fast, they still have the World War II themes and their music is still fairly brutal, so there is a vision of old Marduk which is contained in this 3 track ep. I recommend the track Warschau 2: Headhunter Halfmoon because it will show you what I mean about their music changing. Although this isn’t the worst thing in the world, it’s definitely not the best thing in the world either. I give Marduk’s Iron Dawn an 11/20. 


No comments:

Post a Comment

free counters
Powered By Blogger