SICULICIDIUM – Last Gallop in the Universe
- Posted on 30-01-2011
While Transylvania has provided much of the inspiration for BM throughout the years, we have not seen too many bands actually hailing from the plains and mountains of Central Romania. Siculicidium have come to right the imbalance with their debut full-length “Utolsó vágta az Univerzumban”, translated as "Last Gallop in the Universe".
The music is a surprising and welcome departure from the hordes of bands we have heard blasting their way to the abyss and back this year. The tracks are slow to mid-paced, building thick layers of doom-tinged, distorted guitar into a hellish fortress of noise. The vocals are a flat croak, sometimes reminiscent of Attila Csihar’s early work with Mayhem, and they complement the instruments and production well.
Most interesting of all are the melodic elements. These don’t come from keyboards and clean vocals as we might expect, but from the riffs and the drumming, which is sometimes almost upbeat and a perfect contrast to the dirge-like guitars. In terms of evolution, Siculicidium are like some strange beast born on an island far from the rest of their kind. You can see straight away that this is BM, but not as we might expect it. I look forward to seeing what they do in the future, whether they will have any influence on the scene and applaud them for being among the most original new BM acts I have heard recently.