Snowblood - Snowblood
Superfi Records

file under different metal

Jasper: What are the odds? After Fall Of Efrafa here another British band comes sailing ashore with a terrific postmetal release, which flames, climaxes impressively, and ultimately collapses with the band along with it. That's right, Snowblood has released its third and final album with this untitled album. My only solace is that I did not know them before, and what is more; I received a beautiful heritage with this LP.

These Scotsmen have visited John Peel once, and I can vividly imagine why. These days it does not happen very often anymore that a band from the Neurosis shool of postmetal impresses like Snowblood does. And yet they succeed, mainly because of their refreshing self-mindedness. This enigmatic little record lasts an hour, but only houses four tracks, also without titles. However, as plain and dull a completely title-less record may seem, so full and versatile does this music sound. The first song starts off melodic and melancholic, like Amenra with clean vocals, only to culminate into a mega-heavy überdoom bonghit, with Iron Monkey-like screams. In the three quarters of an hour that follow the band effortlessly keeps the listener's attention with a wide spectrum of instruments, even during the ear-wrenching noisy experiments.

All of which is impressive, very impressive, especially after the tsunami of postmetal releases we just went through. And so it is a huge pity that there is no Snowblood anymore. Only this beautiful, titleless tombstone. Goodbye Snowblood, you will be dearly missed when yet another inspiration-less Isis-clone marches past our desks. R.I.P.

Rating: 85/100 (details)

http://www.dextro.co.uk/snowblood