Crom - The Fallen Beauty
Let's play the "Guess the style" game, ok? Alright. Label name Deathlike Sound reminds me of the Deathlike Silence label of the murdered Euronymus, former leader of Norwegian underground Black Metal legend MAYHEM. The cover has been drawn by Kris Verwimp, whose works normally can be found on the heavier side of the spectrum and the logo of CROM in its kind also looks rather like Black Metal. So do CROM play Black Metal? Not in the least!
The Landshut based solo project of Crom (only supported by a session drummer) draws its influences from somewhere (almost) completely else and the sound of the first three songs already hints at what the fourth one, "Man Of Iron", then fully confirms. "Man Of Iron"? Hold on, there was something… Exactly, BATHORY. The epic BATHORY as we (or at least I) know and love them from such outstanding albums such as "Hammerheart" or "Twilight Of The Gods".
The own compositions of CROM follow in pretty much comparable waters, mostly slow paced, with melodic guitars, an epic atmosphere, some acoustic guitars and the BATHORY like chants in the background. And the voice of Crom? It is completely clear, very nice, rather in the deeper end of the spectrum and at least one class better than the one of his big influence Quorthon.
The opening title track excels with this atmosphere right from the start and "Vengeance Part 2" continues this almost seamlessly, even though the speed is increased during the middle part, and here the drums sound somewhat synthetic, which does not take away from the song in any way, though. The more than ten-minute "The Wanderer's House" in big parts remains slow-paced, but through that builds up such an epic mood that the ten minutes are over before you really notice it. Here, too, the epic and big melody lines stand in the foreground, which together with the vocals and lyrics create a very Viking-ish atmosphere, conjuring up pictures of scenes from the Northlands before your mind's eye.
The closing "Man Of Iron" indeed is a BATHORY cover version (off their 1996 "Blood On Ice" album), which is not far off the original, but has one quite delicate difference: the vocals. As said before, Crom has a considerably better voice than Quorthon and therewith adds to this classical song, good one.
Surely BATHORY still are a few steps above CROM, but the Swedes already have a few more years under their belt and in their style (the epic one, of course) there surely is place for another band of this kind and if you take into consideration that "The Fallen Beauty E.P." is only the second EP of the Bavarian, then we can expect quite something from CROM. Even though the BATHORY influence is very, very strong and its shadow might be looming too big for some, I have big hopes for CROM and hope for new material soon as the songs already have been recorded in early 2002 and the homepage talks about an upcoming album called "Vengeance". Go, check it out!
copas from http://www.metal-observer.com/articles.php?lid=1&id=3342
Tracklist:
1. The Fallen Beauty 06:25
2. Vengeance II 06:15
3. The Wanderers House 10:51
4. Man of Iron (Bathory cover) 02:37
mp3 320 kbps
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