There is a type of metal hybrid that I think is quite fascinating if performed right and that is blackened death metal which combines the heaviness and technicality from death metal and the unpleasant atmospheric elements from black metal. Some of these bands contain either more or less from each genre like
Panzerchrist for example. They often use more black metal influences in their music but switch things up a touch and use more death growls instead. Or you have
Sear from Finland who write primarily death metal with hints of black metal elements. I have recently stumbled upon a band that has managed to mix both genres in a way that I feel is an almost perfect combination and this band is called
Ghamorean.
Ghamorean is obviously a blackened death metal band from Umea, Sweden.
Ghamorean is relatively unknown at the moment. Their debut album
Plaguempire didn't strike it big among the metal masses and hopefully their sophomore album will draw some more attention. This genre particularly attracts bands that incorporate cheesy lyrics about Satan ruling the world and such, but not
Ghamorean. They play a different kind of blackened death metal. One will notice that
Eon Eschatos is so much better than
Plaguempire in many ways.
Ghamorean could be loosely labelled as a technical band which can be felt on their second album
Eon Eschatos as the band displays a lot of technical guitar and drum work. In an interview, one of the guitarists said that the album is not necessarily technical, but rather complex due to the large amount of variety in rhythm section changeups. The guitar sound is incredibly crunchy and the overall music feels a lot more balanced this time around.
Eon Eschatos delivers semi-technical blackened death metal with harsh vocals. This type of music will most likely make some diehard metal heads drool, but to the casual metal listener, it contains some good and bad stuff that you should beware of. If you compare this to
Plaguempire you will notice that the music in
Eon Eschatos is way more balanced and refined. Many songs from their previous album started off quite fast but were later reduced in speed and therefore became boring and tedious. This time around, the tracks maintain a good speed and the guitar work always keeps things continually changing and interesting.
Humanity Dethroned,
Order Without Man and
Art Of Defiance are three great examples where the tracks have some really dynamic guitar work. All in all, this has basically been improved in one way or another from their debut, making the music so much more enjoyable and interesting.
Most aspects of this album are great but there are some things that drag the album down a bit. This becomes quite evident with the vocals and a few odd moments here and there. If we listen to the vocals, they have hardly changed since
Plaguempire. The harsh, half-strangled vocals sound a bit one-dimensional because there is absolutely no vocal variety whatsoever. The only difference is that the vocals have a little more thickness, but the overall vocal performance will not impress the listener. The one other flaw in the album are the slightly annoying and weirdly prolonged sections contained throughout the specific songs such as
Art Of Defiance. These minute-long moments of repetitive instrumentation do nothing but drag the song on longer then it needs to be. What is the point of adding filler to a song to only drag the good parts down? Well, this is obviously up to the listeners themselves; some will like it and some will not.
Ghamorean contains all the important necessities to become a successful extreme metal band. They are skilled musicians who are capable of creating quality music. However, the band needs to improve on their existing vocalist or simply find a new one. He has the potential to become a really good vocalist but needs some major improvements. This type of harsh screaming needs to be replaced by some guttural growls and/or ear-piercing screams. All in all,
Eon Eschatos is a very intense and complex album with minor flaws that most fans of the extreme metal scene will push to the side anyways. If you enjoy technical extreme music or Norwegian black metal, then you should give this album a listen. It is not a unique or spectacular album but it definitely stands out from the crowd.
