Dragon Lord
Rapture
Steve Smyth – guitars
Steve DiGiorgio – bass
Jon Allen – drums
Lyle Livingston - keys
In my opinion, the black metal genre, although loaded with
talent, overall does not have a whole lot to offer. Usually the song subjects
are some silly tale of dragons and warriors or how great the artist feels Satan
is, or whatever, and the music usually lacks melody greatly and any type of
hook in their songs, instead relying on how evil they can sound. Such is not
totally the case with Dragon Lord. Yes, the subjects for the majority of the CD
are silly, being about dragons and such, but nothing about Satan being so great
or whatever. The music for the most part actually contains a great melody, but
then again, when you look at the members of the band, a supergroup, you realize
why. Testament founder Eric Peterson, Jon Allen (Sadus, Testament), Steve
DiGiorgio (Testament, Death, Iced Earth, etc.), Lyle Livingston (Psypheria),
and Steve Smyth (Testament, Death) are the band members. They manage to find
every good element of black metal and throw them all into one CD, something
that is rarely done. While doing that, they do a great job in finding many of
the bad elements of black metal and throwing them out as well. The album starts
off with the instrumental track “Vals de la Muerte” which sets the dark tone
for the album before flying into “Unholy Void”, a great first actual song for
the album, with a solid melody, many great hooks, and some very complex
musicianship shown throughout the entire song. Other great songs on the album
include “Tradition and Fire”, “Born to Darkness”, “Judgement Failed”, “Wolf
Hunt”, “Spirits in the Mist”, and “Rapture” (which sounds an awful lot like
“Riding the Snake from Testament’s ‘The Gathering’ (wonder why that could be)).
Each song has its own sound to it, all sticking mostly to the black metal
genre. One thing that is usually a problem with the black metal genre for me
though is the vocals. The raspy and usually annoying sound that is required
from them to fit the genre. Overall, there is some of that on the CD, but it
isn’t nearly as bad as some other bands. Eric does a great job on them as far
as black metal goes. They’re still somewhat annoying, but black metal can get
much worse.
The sound quality on this album is pretty normal. Black metal
does require a somewhat produced sound to sound at its best, but it doesn’t
need to be overdone by any means and in this case it isn’t.
This is a great example of what black metal should be to please
me. It still isn’t my genre of choice by any means, but this is a CD that I can
sit down and listen to without coming close to getting fed up with it. Out of
100, this gets a 78 (compare that with other black metal scores I’ve given and
you’ll see what it really means).
Track listing
1.
Vals de la Muerte
2.
Unholy Void
3.
Tradition and Fire
4.
Born to Darkness
5.
Judgement Failed
6.
Wolfhunt
7.
Spirits in the Mist
