Necrodemon专辑介绍：Noktorn, March 8th, 2010 Well this certainly is... something. I guess the gimmick here is that it's a death/thrash band singing about ice rather than Immortal, but I wonder what the thought process was that led to such an aesthetic choice. I mean, was it that there wasn't enough ice-themed music, or just that the field of ice-themed death/thrash was a market ripe with potential? Did they write all the music with the theme in mind or did they say "you know these riffs sound kind of frozen" and go with it? Whatever. It could be the power of suggestion due to the art and song titles, but it does seem like Necrodemon evokes the feeling of cold and winter pretty well. Instead of going with wholly traditional death and thrash riffing, there's a greater emphasis on bright yet dissonant little tremolo numbers, Bathory by way of death metal bombastic chords, and sort of tight, paranoid song structures that grant the music an air of claustrophobia. It's a pretty effective study on how to get aesthetic and music to mirror each other; whether the idea was chosen or the music was written first is immaterial as either way each mimics the other pretty well. Now, as far as how much I like the music... well, it's pretty much oldschool death/thrash, something I'm not entirely fond of. Due to the somewhat unique riffing style and melodic ideas I can't really point to any bands in particular as being a good point of reference, though the vocal performance does bring Don Doty to mind (when he was at his silliest); there's a lot of yelping and high-pitched snarling. Little hints of old Obituary are present in the slower moments, but beyond that there seems to be a hint of modern black metal here and there in the way riffs are introduced and laid out with different rhythmic variations. Perhaps the best comparison would be to the first Darkthrone record (ironically, another frosty oldschool death metal release), though this doesn't quite feel so cloudy and weird for want of a better term. There's a substantial amount more blasting on this release than one would typically associate with the rest of the music, but it's employed pretty well, generally used in a black metal technique of being held over some of the more stark, droning tremolo riffs, breaking into different rhythms when the riffing becomes a bit more convoluted. Above and beyond the mild umbrage I take at death/thrash in general, my main complaint about this is how silly it is. I cannot tell for the life of me whether the band is playing it straight or tongue in cheek when they write songs about yetis. There's an inherent sort of ridiculousness in this album that goes beyond just the aesthetic and into the riffing and especially the vocals. Some of the riffs are just ridiculous; 'So Cold, So Evil' (christ, that title) in particular is a big offender, being six minutes of essentially nothing but very silly riffs and overly throaty, declarative vocals. This sort of brings to mind what would happen if a bunch of guys who played in bar rock bands decided to make a death metal band; it feels kind of disconnected from the rest of the genre, like it's made by middle-aged guys who have heard some Obituary and Grave and stuff but aren't really sure what makes death metal what it is. There's a lot of variation on this release, though I'm not sure I'd call it good; the faster tracks are probably better than the slower ones, which tend to suffocate under their pomp and would-be grandeur. Even those, though, are sort of offputting; the riffs are interesting but still somewhat generic, like they're old Scandinavian riffs played with a little bit of confusion over what chord goes where. 'Ice Fields Of Hyperion' never really seems to hit its stride; it clearly has an idea and a very clear musical vision in mind, but I don't think Necrodemon really knew how to go about bringing it to life in a manner that wouldn't make people like me giggle. This isn't bad (though the running time gets tedious about two thirds through), but there's enough little idiosyncrasies about this release to put me off it more or less. I commend the band trying something new and knowing what they want to do, but I'm not sure if the execution came out as intended or even if it was a worthwhile goal to pursue. Maybe someone who actually enjoys oldschool death/thrash as a rule would get more mileage and novelty out of this, but I can only really call this a curiosity buy at best.