Wednesday 1 April 2015

Tharaphita - Ulestous (CD Review)


01.Ülestõus (Uprising)
02.Viimsepäeva koidik (The Dawn of Armageddon)
03.Luupainaja (The Nightmare)
04.Tuhandeaastase orjaöö tuhast (From the Ashes of a Thousand Years of Slavery)
05.Sõnad sõlmedesse (Knotting the Words)
06.Surma-arbujad (Sorcerers of Death)
07.Tuuled rändavad ringi (Winds Wander)
08.Terasest taotud teel (On a Road Made of Steel)

Ank (vocals/Guitar)
Benton (Guitar)
Draconic (Guitar/Synthersiser)
Brutalis (Bass)
Melu (Drums)



Created as a solo project of the vocalist-guitarist Ank, Tharaphita soon became one of the most influential and unique Estonian pagan metal bands. The idea of Tharaphita was created in 1993, the band was planned to carry the name Ancestral Damnation, and the music to be raw black-metal.
For different reasons, the idea somewhat changed and developed further until the first rehearsals with the initial line-up of Tharaphita in March 1995. During August and September of the same year, the first rehearsal demo Must Viirastus was recorded.

The first gig of Tharaphita took place in 18.05.1996. For now, there have been more than 100 gigs, also in other Baltic states, Finland and Norway, besides the homeland Estonia.
During the time, black-metal core of the music became complemented by pagan thinking, some epic elements and influences of heavy and thrash metal. The new album’s music is a mix of black, heavy and thrash metal. The lyrics are mainly in Estonian and are mostly inspired by Estonian history.

The cover of the latest album “Ülestõus” depicts the main crater of lake Kaali, which was formed by a meteorite thousands of years ago.

'Uprising' sounds like an intresting mix of Satyricon and Amon Amarth, blending various elements of extreme metal with near thrash structures, not much in the way of those symphonic style viking bands, this is less subtle and sticks with the aggression.

Each of the following songs just does the same, an epic and refined mixture of genre influences, all the time you almost forget it's not sung in English, somehow it doesn't matter the vocals carry the songs perfectly.

My fave track is the last one, its a mainly instrumental piece with some quite outstanding bass and drum work.

Rating 9/10

For fans of: Bathory, Skyforger, Satyricon, Amon Amarth

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