Tefilla

Item: Grievous Anguish
Author: HadeSlayeR

Grievous Anguish

(1998)

Reviewed by HadeSlayeR

Discogs YouTube

Label Fear Dark RecordsDead Zine1998

death metal groove metal thrash metal

When I heard this I couldn't stop thinking of the similarity of the vocals to the secular Pantera. They possess the same throaty voice. But this band is more groovy than Pantera and their playing style is slower than the secular band. This album was recorded in 1996 but only released now; 2 years after the original recording.

The CD starts with "Sanguis" - Well don't ask me what it means cuz I don't know myself. A groove influenced song, quite average IMO. The only part of the lyrics that I can hear (it doesn't come with a lyric sheet) is 'Blood Of Jesus cast down' or something like that. Some really deep growl can be heard on this song but only for a very short time at different parts of the song. At least this song is better than the next song "Grievous Anguish" in which the slow picking made me think that this was going to be a killer track. But sadly my expectations weren't met. The title track is a real disappointment. The guitar sound is what I think I can describe as a 1 2 3, 1 2 3, 1 2 3 beat (the army style). Real boring. It lapses back into the original slow picking/strumming style as the opening with slow deep voice singing which moves between the faster pace and the original opening slow pace. But I can't get into this track. It slowly fades into obscurity.

"The Judge" A low shout starts this song off. Again the melody and tempo doesn't impress me; but at least it's better than the previous song which sounds the same all throughout the whole song. "The Judge" has some mean parts in it. It goes fast and the voice sounds like the voice box is going to be damaged soon.

"The Pillar" The frosty howl of the wind will let one feel like he/she is lost in the forest. The way the guitar comes in wasn't in my expectation. I expected slow classical guitar to introduce the song gradually. But in fact real heavy riffs are mixed softly and gradually becoming louder and louder till it overwhelms the howling of the northern wind. Quite out of one's expectation. The throaty voice at least is quite at home with the sound of the 6-strings. At least this song is better than the above songs. Although there is no classic, there are quite a number of nicely placed beat changes in this song.

"Exorators Chapel" which follows begins with severely distorted guitars. Now the vocals remind me greatly of the band Godfear. This song possesses massive groove in it. It made me flow with the groove quite easily. At around 3 mins it stops abruptly and starts again with the sound of children playing and a blues (well not quite, more like lounge music) influenced lick..

"Funeral Of Death" The sound of this song can be compared to Mortification's Blood World era, but personally I didn't like Blood World myself. But like the rest of the songs, "Funeral Of Death" does not possess much melody or tune if you like to call it tune. Much like the band Crimson Thorn who has heaviness but not melody in their music.

"Horn Of Salvation" the longest track off this album, and this song is the most varied of all the songs. It possesses a distinctive melody occasionally, with it lapsing into many different moods at different parts of the song. After it stops (or so I thought) it resurrects as an instrumental.

If this band can release some newer materials and more songs with stronger melody, who knows maybe they will overthrow Pantera 1 day.

6/10