The Crow The debut of this incredible band from Israel was this good EP...

Their ideas was not really clear yet, and the sound is poor... But this is a really interesting hearing anyway. The first song from Orphaned Land were more Death Metal oriented than their later El Norra Alila, and not so complex, imaginative and improved like the masterpiece Mabool. But it's original enough to having a good rating...

The rough death metal riffs are mixed with some oriental instruments, and hearing some Arabic melodies mixed with the Kobi Fahri's growls is something unique... We must admit that Orphaned Land were maybe the pioneers of this mixture between 80's and 90's death metal with the traditional music from Israel. And we have better work from this band than this immature EP... But the roots and the good ideas were here yet.

Best tracks: Seasons Unite (good and complex track), Above you All (with a great oriental melody used again in Mabool...) and The Beloved's Cry (a classic acoustic and obligated in the Orphaned Land's concerts).

Conclusion: rough, immature and short... But full of new ideas and some good songs. Sahara improved this style and some of this songs later, El Norra Alila was another step forward, Mabool was the confirmation and their great masterpiece... But The Beloved's Cry gave us a glimpse of the incredible potential of this band: deep and conceptual lyrics, good Kobi Fahri singing, the typical Yossi Sassi solos, and use of traditional instruments.

The elemets were here, they only had to be polished.

My rating: ***

P.S.: this review was originally written for ProgArchives, and rewritten to be included here.

UMUR "The Beloved's Cry" is a demo album by Israelian progressive extreme metal act Orphaned Land. The demo was originally released by the band but has since been re-released a couple of times. The M.D.M.A Records re-release version from 1999 features an added DVD bonus track.

The music on "The Beloved's Cry" is Doom/Death metal. There are a few middle eastern sounding parts but they are very few and don´t necessarily hint at where the band would go just a few years down the line. Artists like early Paradise Lost and November´s Doom come to mind. Most tracks on the album is in a doom/death metal style with deep growling vocals and heavy doomy but predominantly mid-paced riffs. The title track stands out though as it is a ballad/duet where vocalist Kobi Farhi sings clean vocals and is complimented by a female vocalist. It´s nice for the variation of the release, but not exactly spectacular. It reminds me a bit of the most goth tinged Moonspell.

The musicianship is decent but not too interesting. The deep growling vocals are the highlight here. The sound production is pretty good considering the fact that this is a demo. The sound quality is not up to par with professional sound productions though. Overall "The Beloved's Cry" is a decent release by Orphaned Land, but it lacks the original sound that Orphaned Land would develop later on. A 2.5 star (50%) rating is warranted.

Time Signature Above you all...

Genre: melodic death metal with a hint of Middle Eastern folk

Now hailed as the leading Middle-Eastern folk metal band preaching peace and tolerance, Orphaned Land actually started out an extreme metal band. Their 1993-demo "The Beloved's Cry" captures their transition from an extreme metal band to their present-day status. It was reissued in the late 90s, and End of the Light Records have reissued it this year as well, this time in digipak format.

Stylistically, the release leans more towards death metal than Middle-Eastern folk metal, and the listener can expect lots of growls and aggressive crunching riffage; there are even a couple of blastbeats every now and then. That being said, the eclectic and progressive folk metal tendencies of their later releases are definitely present on the release, in the form of, for instance, the Middle-Eastern figures that many of the guitar solos are based on, as well as in certain vocal melodies (in addition to the growls, there are clean male and female vocals on the release) and in the more progressive and atmospheric passages that are scattered throughout the release.

The release also features two bonus tracks, which are much more oriented towards Middle-Eastern progressive music, and even features some electronica elements. They are definitely interesting, but seem a bit misplaced against the backdrop of the otherwise dark and extreme-metal oriented music of the original demo.

The production is, of course, of 1990s demo tape quality, so do not expect a pristine and polished-sounding release. Still, the production is way better than the majority of metal-demos released in the early 1990s.

Perhaps one of the first ever so-called Oriental death metal releases, "The Beloved's Cry" is definitely worth a listen if you are a fan of Orphaned Land or of later acts such as Arkan or Scarab.