The United States is a strange, magical country where pixies and white supremacists frolic side by side, where children under the age of 16 smoke crack and where the greatest claims to fame of their latest two presidents has been that one’s dumb and one’s black.
Judging from what I just said you might not think the US is great for black metal. Hell, I sure don’t think it is. Right now, patriotic Americans are rising out of their seats, raising the stars and stripes and by God all mighty raising one hell of a Texan shit storm at that comment. But hey, it’s true. Not to disrespect the Yankees, their contributions to music have been amazing over the years (no matter how many times I listen to it, “Severed Survival” is still awesome). Yet no matter how hard they try, the Europeans will still beat them at black metal. After all, the spiritual homeland of black metal is over in Europe. American black metal is a bit like the American cricket team: Nowhere near as good as Australia and really, not entirely natural.
That said, they (myself being sick and tired of saying “American” in this review already) do occasionally make something worth listening in the realm of black metal. Take Akasha: an excellent US black metal band with a hint of viking metal. I’ll usually listen to their sole album once every couple of weeks, if not every week. Forests of Old, thankfully, are another US black metal band that’s actually worth listening to. It’s nothing ground breaking, it’s not a “revolution in black metal” and it’s not particularly OH SO SUVERN LAWD, but it’s a nice EP. Immediately off the bat, there’s something wrong with it: a build up, or fade in if you wish, into the first song. Black metal fade ins suck, unless it’s Burzum. Forests of Old is not Burzum, this is a fact. It’s made all the more excruciating by the fact that it’s well over a minute and a half before the ultra-quiet fade in gives way proper.
When it does though, it’s pretty darn good. “Voices from Oblivion” is not the kind of EP you’ll throw on every five minutes. It’s a seasonal kind of thing. Despite what the band might be aiming for, winter and all its associated frostiness, “Voices from Oblivion” is really more of a late-winter, early-spring thing. It’s actually a nice change to be honest, I’m sick of hearing new black metal bands either going for an ultra-thin, “wintery” sound, or an ultra-thick, “shit” sound. The production on the EP is somewhere in the region of the early EPs, which is accentuated by the excellent use of synths throughout the EP.
Individually, the songs aren’t very distinguishable. Luckily, “Voices from Oblivion” is short enough for it not to become a problem. The song writing is solid, the drums are REAL and the vocals are very well performed. The longer songs don’t feel long, which is how it should be. All these things stack up, and I like things that are stacked.
But then, not all is well over in the United States. It seems they still haven’t cracked the Eurocode and created something truly brilliant. Akasha made an album that suffered from a poor second half, and Forest s of Old has its own big problem: too much ambient. Ambient, or perhaps dark ambient as is probably a better fitting term, is unfortunately in common use in black metal. I say unfortunately because it usually just doesn’t work. Forests of Old are making good, perhaps great black metal here, and it perplexes me as to why they put a two and a half minute ambient track in the EP (“Pride’s Victim”, if you must know) as well as an ambient lead up to “The Flesh Consumed in Flame” which frankly takes up far too much of the playing time for the song’s length. Worst of all, the band finishes with an ambient track…
STOP. That’s like looking left, and then crossing a road without looking right. It’s STUPID. Please people, you do not, under any circumstances, finish a black metal release with an ambient track. Why? Because it sucks. The last song on an album should be one of the stand outs. It should make you want to get through the entire album just so you can hear it. As it stands, I skip “From Within the Fog” because it is, no doubt about it, boring. Feel free to slap a minute or so of ambient on the end of the final track to wind down the album (preferably after a triumphant climax), but don’t do another bloody two and a half minute full track, especially if you’ve already had one near the start! As it stands, two of five tracks on this EP are ambient. That is not right for a straight-forward black metal release such as this.
Other than that though, this is solid. The black metal on display is good and considering it’s from the US, that’s pretty darn amazing. However “Voices from Oblivion” is let down by the sinking feeling that this would have been better (10/100 points at least) if Forests of Old would have simply dropped the ambient and released the three black metal tracks on here. It’s something that, while it shouldn’t affect your overall judgement too much, is a bit of a letdown. It’s a mistake on the part of the band, and I really hope they realise that and rectify it on their next release. With that all said: bring on the next release!
On a final side note, I’d like to remark on the professionalism on the packaging done by NTR and Karnstein Records. It’s nice to see small labels putting so much effort into their release, though I wish NTR would stop releasing CD-Rs!
Sample:
Sample:
