SVARTSYN — The True Legend (review)

SVARTSYN — The True Legend album cover Album · 2012 · Black Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
3.5/5 ·
Time Signature
Tearing your soul...

Genre: black metal

While Svartsyn's previous releases were said to be ambient at times and progressive and complex at times, "The True Legend" is a pretty straighforward affair.

There are some not-so-straightforward time signatures every now and then, and Svartsyn also offer some spacey synths in some tracks, but on the whole, we are dealing with quite digestible and expressive black metal, offering typical genre features such as blastbeating and tremolo picking along with harsh vocals. At times, the harmonies are quite tense, but most of the time there is a strangely melodic feel to the guitars. One thing that is almost refreshing is the punky and simple nature of some of the riffage, which helps make this release one this is capable of reaching beyond the horde of black metal fans and serve as a portal into the dark universe of this genre to the uninitiated.

The production is no polished, but not raw either - so, while we the performance on the album seems rather organic and probably has not been processed, Svartsyn's "The True Legend" is definitely not as nasty or filthy as raw black metal. The mix, however, is unbalanced - and the guitars are too weak in the mix for my taste, with the vocals and drums being very dominant. While this does not sit well with me, I think that the reverb-rich vocals will probably appeal a lot to seasoned fans of the genre.

Dark, expressive, tense, but yet strangely melodic, Svartsyn's latest effort is an interesting and relatively easily digestible slab of black metal that will definitely appeal broadly within the armies of black metal fans and perhaps even beyond them.
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