Rating: 7.5

Country: UK

Release Date: 2008

Record Label: Self Released

Track list:
1. Aerie Descent
2. Funeral Marches to the Grave
3. Lovely Children
4. Fairytales
5. Fall
6. Thule
7. Home
8. You That Mingle May
9. Into the Promised Land
10. Lacus de luna
11. Mare frigoris
12. Into the Promised Land
13. Lacus de luna
14. Thule
15. Fall

Band Website: Scythian

Scythian - Suffering to the Conquered

S. Vrath - Bass, Vocals
A. Satyrus - Rythm and Lead Guitars
J. C. Volgard - Drums, Backing Vocals

Although most people are more than pleased with the emergence of black, thrash, death and doom metal as distinct genres, it is not uncommon to encounter the sentiment that the primal extreme metal of the early eighties is preferable to the later genres they would inspire. And given both the groundbreaking songwriting, the genuine love of metal and the face-smashing riffage of bands like Sodom, Sarcofago, Hellhammer, Bathory, Possessed and Slayer to name but a few, it is quite understandable for a band to want to return to a sound like that. This pretty much has two possible outcomes: either the band is of a decidedly retro bent and merely retreads the same ground as the bands they copy, thus making themselves obsolete from the outset, or a band makes sure they still advance the sound of their forebears, but in a direction different from the one that was taken by most bands of that time period. These bands are sort of alternative history takes on the way extreme metal could have (and probably in their opinion should have) developed. Morrigan and Faustcoven are awesome examples of this latter phenomenon and the British newcomers from Scythian can be placed in that all-too-rare category as well.

Take Bathory's black thrash songs from Blood, Fire, Death and add in copious amounts of death-thrash by way of early Sodom and Kreator, Root, Tormentor and the earliest Brazillian albums from Sepultura, Vulcano and Sarcofago and add in some more modern linear song-writing and atmospheric elements and you have an approximation of what this demo sounds like. It isn't hard to imagine this being released around '87 or '88 and making a splash and turning heads for advancing the extreme metal genre and kicking ass.

For most of its duration Suffering to the Conquered is set to speed fast and thrashes the fuck out, employing the chugging, power chording and almost-tremolo melodic riffing of their extreme metal forebears, while being slightly more narrative in their composition and having some truly stupendous, echoing, clean backing chants pop up on occasion along with solos that are either of the completely shredding, atonal variety or more traditional heavy metal soaring leads you'd find in even earlier bands, but which fit right in with the more epic songwriting approach which is their advancement from the bands Scythian is inspired by. The vocals alternate between a gruff death-thrash bark and a pretty grim pre-black metal screaming (meaning they don't turn into screeching, just as the deeper vocals don't become an actual grunt) and the drumming is impeccable, not too flashy, but with plenty variety, which is always a good thing when a band only rarely slows down.

This demo consists of five medium length songs plus a cover of Bathory's "Holocaust" which doesn't really stray from the source material. The five original songs are just the right length, longer than typical material from their inspirations suiting the slightly more involved songwriting, but still short enough to deliver their punch expediently and not overstaying their welcome. They come, see and conquer alright.

Suffering to the Conquered is as of yet self-released, but they've been picked up by Galactic Records, so I wouldn't be surprised if this sees an eventual label release. Of course, if you want to stay in the spirit of the eighties underground, you really should contact these guys directly and get the demo from them, which would certainly be more fitting for metal of this type.

June 25th, 2008