Review Summary: Ride your zombie horse into battle - like a man.
The battlefield is silent and ice-laden. The breath of a thousand soldiers blows into the air, and disappears. The light of a new dawn falls upon the quiet plains of Bavaria. The thirst for blood and victory runs through the crowd, nothing else on their minds. No pastries will be consumed on this day. You draw your claymore, one hand on the reigns of your eight legged steed. Looking forward, you stare into the eye of your enemy, the scum of the Earth. The Dutch. With a mighty roar, you fly towards the Calvinist insects, their feet adorned with clogs. How you hate those f!cking clogs. As you crash down upon their frightened faces, you swing your broadsword, slicing at the legs of a hundred soldiers. Spears whistle past your head, The fight rages on and on, until the battle subsides, casualties high on either end. Among all the hell, you survived. Breathe in again. Breathe in victory.
Drautran's
Throne Of The Depths is the soundtrack to all of your epic fantasies. But let me be clear here - this isn't Rhapsody Of Fire, so put your buttless chaps away. This also isn't Darkthrone. Drautran, hailing from Germany, create a fresh mix of black metal that's epic, and yet also menacing and evil. It's a little hard to categorize the sound, because, well, it's not entirely symphonic. It's not entirely tremolo picking either. But let's start with what it is - pretty great music. The production here is a little different from most black metal, but is something I think fans of all kinds of the genre will enjoy. Overall, the record has a sound that's both polished, and at the same time, extremely clean. Imagine if you will, the band at a stage in recording. They've just laid down the bass, with volume at the standard 'zero', and the drums, with blast beats at 'maximum'. Now, the guitars need to be done. One of the guys takes his dad's answering machine, and goes behind the cabin (because all black metal bands have cabins) with his electric guitar. The other, patiently waits, until a knock on the frosted window sounds. Now, the band mate indoors lays down the acoustic passages, to be used with the chorus. Now, imagine all of this being smushed together in a 'recording studio'. That's the sound of Drautran - it goes from being this raw, unpolished mess of guitars, to this clear, Agalloch-ish tone.
Now, as far as lyrical content goes, well... I have no f!cking clue. The band sings in German, and even audio samples in the songs are German. If I had to take a guess from the music, I'd predict something like WolfChant, but less cheesy sounding. Pagan tales, with grand stories of raping virgins in the name of Cthulhu, or getting drunk while lying on large rugs made of several bears. But the lyrics don't matter, because the rest of the music is awesome. The vocals are harsh, shrieked, and disembodied, but often become chanted during clean passages. That's right, there's clean passages! Often, the music switches from the blast beat ridden assault to sections filled with beautiful acoustic guitar melodies, keyboards, and choir-boy vocals. It's a really great change in the music, because, in all honesty, Drautran does a good job with being 'brutal', but it does get a little tiresome. So, instead of paying for that Mayhem record, and that Agalloch EP, you get both in one album. It's a total win, right?
There's not much to dislike about this album, or this band, if you're into black metal. As far as I know, they're not Satanists, or Nazis, they're just making good music. It can get a little boring at times, maybe even a little overwhelming, but in the end, it's definitely a good album. Check it out, and don't forget your black robes.
