Review Summary: NDH sort of like early Rammstein. Except that they’re Finnish. And the main vocals are death growls.
When I recently discovered Turmion Katilot’s first album, Malpractice (Finnish:
Hoitovirhe), it quickly found its way onto my list of Superb albums. This may be an over-enthusiastic rating, but time will tell. In the English speaking media they are often classified as an "NDH" band, that is, as part of the “New German Hardness” movement. But this feels unfairly oxymoronic to me since they’re Finnish, and the Finns are fiercely proud to be so.
Anyway, that first album has a sound reminiscent of Skrew, Fear Factory, Rammstein’s first album Herzeleid, and ultimately Ministry’s “Psalm 69” and “The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste.” NDH has a characteristic fast, thumpy beat that is standard on all of Turmion Katilot’s albums, but on albums following the first one they frequently cranked up the tempo on a few tracks from a basic NDH “Thump, Thump, Thump” to a faster “thumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthump” that doesn’t work for me.
Compared to the first album, two sounds have evolved that are evident on Omen X, their most recent offering: The vocals -- which started off as more Hardcore -- became death growls, and they lost the super fast tempos.
Besides the death growls -- which have a little too much gurgle for my taste, but oh well -- there are also a number of other vocal varieties on offer: A children’s choir, Gregorian chant, at least one chorus accompanied by a shouted crowd; the list could probably go on. Lady song, a staple on many of their previous albums, is amply distributed throughout this album also, with an effect reminiscent of a faster version of Sofia Portanet’s and Petrozza’s duet on Kreator’s song
Midnight Sun. Having been a teenager when Cannibal Corpse was a young band, it’s weird to my ears to hear a soprano singer accompanying a death growl, but it's sort of common in metal these days, and here it has a surprisingly appealing effect.
My big complaint is that there is far too much instrumental sound being squeezed into the songs. Synths form the background on most tracks; not just one line of synth but many (I think), with different timbre’s, all at the same time. Mahler crammed up to at least thirty different instruments in his symphonies, with multiple players on some instruments, plus full choirs, and he put the music together with such clarity that at many moments during a symphony you can train your ears to a specific instrument. Not on this album. Synthetic sounds are much harsher than those that come from “natural instruments” like trombones and clarinets; too many synths and they start to distort. Add in the electric guitars and you just get a blur; I’m left on many tracks wishing I could get a clearer sound. But I’m still going back to it, so it can’t be that bad. I’ll pick it up soon and see if my mp3 player’s various equalizer settings can do a better job than my phone is doing in clarifying the sound.
Or maybe I just have to give it time to soak in. Possibly that's what the artists had in mind.
I haven't had enough time with Omen X to recommend anything else from it except the singles:
*
Kuolettavia Vammoja
*
Sormenjälki
*
Isä Meidän
