SWORDS OF DARKNESS (USA)
Heathendom
Trinity Records Hong Kong, 2003
The band consist two blood brothers with origin from Vietnam but now reside in the USA. I am not sure which country I should put them in so I choose the one where they are now living. Previously they release "Masters Of The Nebulah Forest" demo/MCD 2000 and a self-titled promo MCD in 2002. Both are released in very limited quantity and I only manage to get a bad tape copy of their demo by trading. The first demo supposes to be released in cassette by some label and I waited but nothing had been released so far. So I can't compare this debut with the previous output but I am sure this CD is their best release to date. With Dimmu Borgir as their influence and yes you will hear the 'cheesy' elements of Dimmu Borgir music. Symphonic black metal, melodic and with keyboards. The CD starts with a video track which you can view using your computer. It is a video for the song "Midwinter Atrocities" (track #3), recorded in a forest. Good video but the viewing quality is quite bad. The problem is the video is in a compressed format (real media format) and you can imagine the poor video quality. Most modern hi-fi will skip the first track. The music clocked for almost 58 minutes (minus 15 second for the video). Various styles of growl used and the keyboards are well placed. Beside metal music, there are some calm atmospheric keyboard passages throughout the music as well. Perhaps many of you are pissing on DB but give SOD a chance. Complex and melodious effort such as "Heathendom" from two souls (with real drum), well, they should get credit for that.
c/o Gary Vu, 1605 Marshall St. NE, Menneapolis, Minnesota 55413, USA.
sworddarkness@hotmail.com
swordofdarkness.cjb.net
3.5/5