Well; I was hesitant as whether to get this CD or not, because I don't usually do demos unless they are well recorded, and from what I had heard on YouTube, this one seemed to sound particularly bad, so I kept giving it a pass in spite of everyone on the scene telling me how important and seminal it was for Argentinian black metal, how it had kind of kick started the ¨true¨ thing and all. Finally, my partner ended up giving me one for my birthday, so I fired up my mega stereo, and proceeded to listen the hell out of it.
Guess what; upon hitting the play button, my concerns were immediately confirmed; flat, it sounded raw, harsh, and devoid of dynamics, but hey, it was a demo after all, and who knows what shoestring budget the author was in upon its recording, so I started applying some heavy equalization and it started sounding way better, almost good. Mind you, this is not Transilvanian Hunger-bad, not nearly so, for every instrument -except for the bass guitar- can clearly be heard.
Now to the music : after a minute and half of a spine-chilling, shouted invocation of and praising for certain demons, the first song hits you like a sledgehammer. The drumming is almost martial, with the occasional double kick drum assault and cascading toms, nothing groundbreaking but very well played, clicktrack-perfect in tempo and execution, with an almost ethereal, intricate and delicate cymbal work . Heavy on the keyboards; it is almost as if new age had been crossed over with black metal, if such a thing exists. Does that sound wrong ? Wrong ! It is simply fantastic; multi instrumentalist Temptor -this is his brainchild in its entirety- plays incredible keyboards. Think Summoning-good keys, but with a style of their very own, and you are halfway there. It is a real pity the guy has seemed to abandon the instrument on their most recent work, which I am a fan of as well.
The vocals are, of course, recited/spoken, as opposed to sung, but that style has always been his trademark and really suits the opus. They are, however, somewhat highly mixed-in, somewhat preventing the great guitar work to be properly heard, yet not burying it to any alarming point. The guitar is nicely panned in the mix and I took no notice of a second one present in the mix, but I may be wrong. Bear in mind this is a no-frills demo, so maybe one guitar was all it took, and I personally don't think another axe would have made much of a difference, since the final result is already very dense, not overly so, just rightly so.
There are a couple of fantastic, tasteful interludes like ¨Campanadas De Lucifer¨, made up of just guitar and bells, breathtaking in its simplicity and beauty, and another one with just keyboard and samples; they work so well as intros to the heavier tracks. The songs tend to be very long; some of them reach the 12-17' mark, with a total running time of over an hour ! Another unusual thing for a demo. Despite their length, these are the most interesting songs, possessing a hypnotic yet highly interesting, mostly mid-tempo cadence to them, and at the same time they kept my feet tapping along; a rare treat. Make no mistake, despite their almost subtle beauty, there is a healthy dosage of brutality within the songs, like an iron fist in a silk glove, if I am allowed the analogy.
The last song is an angrier, furious, faster closer of the album, which invited me to crank the volume and kiss my hearing into oblivion; a proper crowning of what I had by then confirmed as a seminal Argentinian BM record.
This 2017 release comes with a hefty, lavishly laid-out booklet; thick glossy paper, all of the lyrics, and some extremely interesting side notes from the author, a real treat for a black metal CD collector like me. Everything is in Spanish, but the autor's command of the language and intricacy of demonic, dark prose, are really mind-numbing.
If you are not afraid of lo-fi demos, you, like me, might enjoy this work as much as I did. Here is hoping for a modern re-recording of this demo, with better sound and a higher budget, if at all possible.
Sample: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
