UMUR "View to the Dim" is the debut full-length studio album by Danish death metal act Dominus. The album was released through RRS in 1994. Dominus formed in 1991 and they were one of the more active and prolific death metal acts on the Danish underground scene of the early 90s. They released two demos and the "Sidereal Path of Colours" single in 1993 before releasing "View to the Dim". Today Dominus are probably mostly known for being the first child of Volbeat frontman Michael Poulsen, but "View to the Dim" couldn´t be much further from the rock´n´roll infused rock/metal of Volbeat...

...because the music on the album is old school death metal through and through. The album opens with the intro track "Symphony of the Goddess", which features samples from the Dead Calm movie (a 1989 thriller featuring Nicole Kidman, Sam Neill, and Billy Zane), before the brutality kicks in with "Tears in Black". And that´s about it, because the rest of the album pretty much sounds like that. Old school Scandinavian death metal delivered by fairly skilled musicians, featuring a decent but not very well sounding production job (the guitar tone is quite unpleasant to the ears, and there is a hollow quality to the sound, which doesn´t suit the music well), and pretty standard quality material, which doesn´t stand out much from the contemporary releases in the genre. Now I said that the material is old school death metal through and through, but it´s not completely true, because when you listen a bit more closely to the album, there´s actually a pretty strong groove influence in the music too. It´s brutal mid-paced grooves, but it´s unmistakably groove metal oriented. In that respect Dominus are slightly similar to their fellow Danish contemporaries in Konkhra.

So upon conclusion "View to the Dim" is not the most remarkable release out there, in terms of featuring an original sound, and as a consequence of the below standard production job, it not a very pleasant listening experience either, so a 2.5 star (50%) rating isn´t all wrong.