Thorngoth – Leere

Germany’s black metal bastards Thorngoth have returned to offer their third full length album, ‘Leere’, to all dark and lost spirits of the world.  Deutsch for ‘empty’, ‘Leere’ is anything but, summoning thick black layers of despair and hatred in a clean production that slices to the bone.  Released on Folter Records, these 9 rituals all contain solid elements of devastating black metal…enough to make poseurs and non-believers run for their lives!

No bullshit instrumental introduction sets the tone for ‘Leere’…that is saved for the direct middle of the album, track 5, ‘In der Leere’…a short and compact bridge between the two sides of the album complete with strings and brass instruments. ’Leere’ begins immediately with a furious attack of blasting, atmospheric destruction and continues to destroy everything in its path.  By the way, each track, save for the previously mentioned, is titled ‘Leere I, Leere II, Leere III…and so on, leading me to believe this is definitely a concept album of sorts.  Each song contains multiple elements and often sound as though they could intertwine with little difficulty. ‘Leere II’, at nearly 8 minutes, shapeshifts between passages effortlessly, leading the listening further down the darkened corridor.  ’Leere V’ starts as a slow and ambient piece, as if watching a fire crawl across a mountainside, before erupting into a hellish and storming black rage.

What I liked best about this release is the craftsmanship of the songs.  There are serious headbanging passages, violent blasting attacks and plenty of atmosphere to experience. The songs know when to blast and when to not…doing so at just the right times.  Nothing sounds forced and Thorngoth change the feel and direction of the songs enough that you don’t grow tired of listening. The performances are killer, I really liked the guitars…both razor sharp and heavy as steel.  The closing track had a certain air of nobility to it as well, making good use of melody and ‘feel’ without directly sounding like a ‘melodic’ black metal band.

While I thought the recording quality of ‘Leere’ was killer, I am a little jaded with hi-fidelity black metal just as many are jaded with ‘raw’ and ‘harsh’ black metal.  To each his own, this album definitely sounds good, which helps me make statements about razor sharp guitars. All in all, I will be listening to this album again and I recommend it to anyone who wants to hear well written black metal performed by musicians who may very well be at their prime!!!

http://www.myspace.com/thorngoth