Rating: 8.0

Country: Slovakia

Release Date: 2003

Record Label: Eclipse Productions

Track list:
1. Vzplanutie slovanskej nenávisti
2. Pohanský boj
3. Vládca zimnej krajiny
4. Cas odplaty
5. Výzva k pomste
6. Slovanská krv
7. V objati lesnej rise
8. Prichod bielej královny
9. Moc ducha pohanského
10. Tajomstvo jaskyne

Total playing time 46:50

Band Website: Algor

Algor - Úder pohanského hnevu

Aldaron - Vocals, Bass, Guitars
Slavfist - Drums

What's up with the region formerly known as Czechoslovakia? It seems a breeding ground for black metal bands that kick ass like nothing else. Algor from current Slovakia is no exception to this. One look at the cover and booklet should be enough to show what Algor is all about. Stylised logo with inverted cross, everything in monochrome, photo's of two corpsepainted guys standing around in the snow and everything written in Slovak. Yes, this has all the hallmarks of black metal of the cult variety and as always this can mean one of two things: it's either a mediocre rip-off of an old Norwegian band that has no personality whatsoever, or it draws its influences from the older bands and creates something in that tradition that is artistically relevant, has personality and evolves the genre.

I'm thankful to report that Algor falls indisputably in the second category, like basically everything coming from their region. While this two-man band is undoubtedly influenced by Darkthrone and Master's Hammer (which Czech/Slovak band isn't?), they take that influence and make something original from it.

Every song here is of the epic variety, with one or two core riffs that return multiple times in each song with a whole bunch of different singularly occurring riffs to form bridges and give different textures to the core ideas, thus forming distinct musical narratives. Each song here has its own personality, each song is memorable and the emotions expressed shift as much (and as effortlessly) as the riffs which express them. Besides their ability to evoke emotions and create epic narratives, the riffs on Úder… simply rock! Anyone not banging his/her head after the first song has properly started, is either deaf, incapacitated or has no musical taste. The types of riffs go from harsh, fastpicked notes to traditional mid-paced heaviness, high-pitched lead/solo sections, tastefully overlaid acoustics, and more. The range of styles employed here is quite large, albeit due to the excellent flow and execution of it all it never sounds like a patchwork. Basswork is erratic, sometimes just following the guitars in the background, at others occupying its own place with interesting progressions. Further adding to the severe rear-kicking is the fantastic drumwork, which sits in that perfect zone between boring blasting and pretentious fucking-around. It's varied, compliments the atmosphere invoked by the riffs and is executed without mistakes. Only negative is the slightly tinny sound of one of the drums, but that soon becomes unnoticeable. The vocals are a commanding harsh shout-type deal, relatively similar to Nocturno on A Blaze…. As with most Czech/Slovak bands, all lyrics are sung in their native tongue giving it extra authenticity. The production is absolutely perfect for this type of release, everything is audible while sounding absolutely harsh, with the lead guitar having that razor-sharp buzzsaw sound and the rhythm guitar sounding nicely heavy, and a clean bass guitar that's audible when it needs to be and otherwise gives added depth to the rhythm-guitar. Drums are quite good too, although as mentioned one piece of the drumset has a tinny sound which can be slightly annoying in some of the faster parts.

This was quite the surprise for me as this is one of those completely underexposed bands, that I checked out based on those black and white pictures, expecting an interesting but derivative Darkthrone worshipping band, with it turning out to become one of my favorite purchases of that year. It doesn't revolutionise the genre, but it does evolve an existing substyle, the varied A Blaze…/Ritual type and it does so with style.

Recommended for fans of the mentioned two albums that influenced this as well as the Czech/Slovak scenes in general.

August 7rd, 2007