Apparently named after a fictional castle from a series of fantasy books by English author Mervyn L. Peake, the Gormenghast under our scrutiny is a no-nonsense Death Metal outfit from the Russian city of Ekaterinburg. The now five-headed, but four-headed at the time of recording – band has been active since 2008 and has released its debut record through Stygian Crypt Records earlier this year.

Resist or Serve is an album offering dark, hellish Death Metal, much in the vein of the old school. That means blast beats, crunchy and chunky guitars and completely incomprehensible vocals.

It seems we got caught in a slurry of Folk and Viking Metal album reviews. Today’s is by Russian band NordverG.

Formed in 2006 as Dragon’s Tears, Crimson Dawn is the band’s first album as NordverG. The record came out in December 2011 and spans nearly three quarters of an hour worth of Folk Metal with Slavonic and Viking-inspired lyrics. A bonus is that the whole thing is in Russian, which turns out to be a lovely smooth language for the purpose. Clearly this is a good one for those of you that dig a piece of Folk Metal with a Northern atmosphere, but also a thick classic Metal sauce.

Not long ago we did a short interview with Russian Tech-Death outfit Shturm, in which vocalist-guitarist Adar talked to us about, among other things, their recently released album Karmaruna. Last week the band released a second music video, for the song Eagles Above Tibet.

Musically Shturm offers us the same blast-beat rich, technical-guitared frenzy that we first heard in Karmaruna’s first single. Eagles Above Tibet carries plenty of story and features a lovely melodic solo towards the end. Solid song!

This album came in with a (now not so)recent load of physical Russian albums from the above record label, and Niek was so kind to share in this late Sinterklaas present, he even gave me a choice! I chose Last Wail as a starter because I never reviewed, and never owned a Folk Metal album before. Now we’re here, seeing whether this album is worth our time.

Last Wail are quite a cool band as they provide the listener with an alternative spin on the whole female Death growlers-concept; some Folk Metal, drenched in Melodic Death Metal. It certainly is a feature that lifts Last Wail out of an depthless pool of Folk- and Melodeath bands that are already out there.
The Tale of Endless Night starts of with a lovely acoustic instrumental, aptly called Intro. From there, the band seem to run through their songs with ease, although that same ease tends to lean to boringness sometimes. A sole light of recognition comes in at the end when the band plays a version of Ensiferium’s Windrider, which is well done, but stands miles apart from the rest of the music, leaving it in the shadows.

It wasn’t very long ago when I wrote a little something about a Russian outfit named Shturm. They are hot shit and so you should read that article if you haven’t already. I thought it worthwhile to sort out an interview with these chaps. Didn’t take long to get it arranged!

Thanks to Adar, vocalist and guitarist, for answering the questions and to Alex, from the band’s label, for arranging the interview for us!

Just got a message about this band called Shturm. I cannot begin to compare this to anything I’ve ever heard, but it’s good. Boy is it GOOD!

Shturm is a group of four guys from Krasnodar, Russia, a city located in the South-Western corner of the country. Taking a quick look through the band’s profile page on Encyclopaedia Metallum, my guess is the band started out in 2003, doing a brutal sort of Black Metal. Their first record came out in 2004 and carries the title unambiguous title Fresh Christian Meat.

Stepping forward in time to the current year, the band released its third album, called Karmaruna. I don’t proclaim to have heard anything more of that than the one song for which they released a video, but that does seem to suggest the band have drastically developed their style since 2004. I’ve lined up the video past the jump.

Only four songs and with a mastering that leaves a lot to be desired. But man am I digging this motherfucker!

Wall of the Eyeless are just two chaps, SL and Simon. The first is Russian, lives in Sweden, plays bass and all guitars and grunts around a bit. The latter is Swedish and bangs the bongos. They found each other only a few months ago and already came up with a first demo, downloadable for free (‘name your price’) on BandCamp. Worth your while!

Where Equal Minds Theory went abso-fuckin’-lutely completely mental on our ass, another Russian band, called Cosmonauts Day, takes a whole different approach today. I’m not mentioning the two bands together here, or reviewing them so shortly after another, as the two bands are connected. Both hail from Moscow and they share members as well, at least guitarist Dima – the rest I’m unsure of, as I can’t read the Cyrillic on EMT’s album art.

But there are also differences, and they are larger than the similarities. Where EMT is completely fucked up Mathcore on some techno-club drug – I don’t necessarily mean that in a bad way, as you’ll be able to judge from that review – Cosmonauts Day, named after a Russian holiday that was instituted after Yuri Gagarin’s first flight into space in 1961, take an approach that is Sludgy, atmospheric, dreamy and melodic. And surprisingly harmonic.

What I know is that this is Ruskie Metal: Equal Minds Theory inhabits Russia’s capitol of Moscow. I know there are five band members and that they claim to do fierce live performances. Judging by that band pic and a whole bunch of other ones on their Facebook I’d say that’s true. I also would know the members’ names, but I can’t read Cyrillic. So then I’m clean out of facts and all I’ve got to go on is ‘ze music’ on this self-titled release I’ve got from the band.

Based on the date listed on the group’s BandCamp (you can also stream and buy the album there), the record came out in October of last year. It contains 37 minutes of blistering, face-melting mathematically-inspired ear-punishment, divided across eleven tracks. The division is a little unfair though; one song’s as short as twenty seconds, while the album’s closing song puts in over fourteen minutes.

About half a year ago we posted something about Welicoruss, a bunch of Russian Symphonic Black Metallers that many of you will have heard about throughout your Metal-loving careers. Today we’re back. Not with new songs, but with an awesome new music video as well as an interview with the band’s frontman / vocalist / guitarist, Alexey Boganov.