Demo Review: Pandemonium – Promo 2010
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Band: Pandemonium (Poland) Album: Promo 2010 Genre: Black / Death Metal See that bunch of tough looking Poles down there? The bunch that looks at you like you’re a baby they’re about to have for breakfast? That’s Pandemonium, a not-so-God-fearing quartet from the city of … Łódź – I’m having some difficulty pronouncing that – active in the sub-department of what they themselves term ”Satanic Dark Metal”. |
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Their ”Promo 2010” recently reaches my address by effort of Greg of Godz ov War Productions, active in band management, press and promotion duties. The demo contains only two songs that will later be featured on the band’s upcoming studio album, Misanthropy, to be released in the fall of 2011, according to the accompanying press release. We haven’t got that yet and so we’ll just give you our take on Black Forest and God Delusion, the two songs in question.
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We’ll kick off by giving you the former of the two to stream while you read.
What the band terms to be ”Satanic Dark Metal”, I’d actually throw somewhere in the middle between Black Metal and Death Metal. Technically the promo is very much Black Metal, in terms of riffs, use of despairing and agonized screams, and flat sounding drums. But atmosphere-wise, it’s much more Death Metal, with guitars sounding pretty ”warm” and deeper growling vocals that make up the majority of the vocal efforts.
But these are not growls like you’ll have come across often. There are like an indistinguishable gargling, as if he’s simultaneously trying to do his vocals while holding a good mouthful of Vodka in. It’s completely and utterly not understandable. Not necessarily a problem, but I still don’t really like the vocals, despite that they grow on you a bit.
This is different from the music, which does manage to deliver a certain special experience. Much of this is due to the unorthodox combination of styles, but there are also the melodic but pain-inducing lines and simply the open and warm ”color” of the whole sound. Pandemonium has a little something special in its hands. Still rough and unpolished, where especially the growling vocals could do with some extra focus in my view, but also showing huge potential. Recommended for those of us that haven’t been to church in a while, unless perhaps to set fire to it.
My Grade: 7/10
Buy this when:
- you can get your hands on it. Which I doubt you can as it’s a demo
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 8:43 am
This might become something with the album. Not such a fan of the gargling vocals either.
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 12:43 pm
I just did a little research on these guys and found that they’ve been at it for over twenty years and have released six albums, three of which were released between ’95 and ’04 under the band name Domain. There seems to be some level of evolution in their music and the vocals are definitely better on the older stuff I just heard, maybe it’s just the demo quality with this song.
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 4:30 pm
Could be, it’s definitely not final yet. I knew they had a history as Domain, but not that they went so far back.
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 8:23 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_lWz4aZ7Ps
this song sounds way better but i dont think its the same band
wanted to suggest this earlier but maybe now is a good time for it
dont like this band featured in here… voice sounds strange^^
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 8:25 pm
and again i wasnt using search function before i post something
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 8:27 pm
Indeed, not the same band. I take it you’ve found out we’ve already written about them
They’re good though, I’ll give you that!
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 9:05 pm
@Jonas: That Pandemonium’s entire discography is offered for free download through their official site, under the media/downloads tab. http://www.pandemonium-metal.com/
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 9:31 pm
Hahahaha. I found that band as well while looking for an album called pandemonium. Downloaded their latest effort and I must say, it’s very enjoyable. Prefer it over Dimmu Borgir and a lot of other Symphonic BM bands.
Posted on October 4th, 2011 at 11:17 pm
Do they use a different calendar in Poland? Where I live, fall of 2010 has already come and gone…
Posted on October 5th, 2011 at 7:06 am
I was about to edit it, and then I saw the demo title. What’s up with this backwardness?
Posted on October 5th, 2011 at 9:20 am
My bad, it’s a typo. it should be “fall of 2011″. Thanks for being sharp Eric
Posted on October 5th, 2011 at 10:54 am
No problem Niek. From the way you said it, I couldn’t tell if it was really supposed to be released this year, or if perhaps the info from the band did show an upcoming release in 2010 but for some reason it didn’t happen yet (you just said, “we haven’t got that yet” so that’s why I wondered if maybe the date had just been pushed back or something.)
Posted on October 5th, 2011 at 11:27 am
Yeah cos the name says promo 2010 so :$
Posted on October 5th, 2011 at 1:43 pm
That’s ’cause the promo is from 2010 and the album should be released fall 2011. I can see the confusion though