Kev Rowland Johann Wolfgang Pozoj is an avant-garde black metal band from Croatia who formed in 2004 by combining two groups, Intoxicate and Grob. They released their debut album in 2006, the first part of a planned trilogy. The second part, ‘Escape of Pozoj’, was released in 2009, after which they were approached by Code666 who suggested that they revisit the concept and possibly re-record some of what they had already released. So, the debut ‘Birth of Pozoj’ was re-recorded and released in May 2011 and this followed in November of the same year. That these guys are tight are never in doubt, but for me it is somewhat let down by the production as the riffs and bleakness aren’t as powerful as I feel that they should be. The result is an album that contains many of the elements that I would expect from this type of music yet isn’t as over the top as I would expect it to be.

I have played it a great deal, and I often feel that I am missing out on something as there are definitely hints of greatness in what they do, but they are too few and too far between although I know that many reviewers have raved over this, yet I feel unable to do so. There needs to be more menace and atmosphere for this to really work for me, but it is still an interesting album and something that black metal fans should investigate for themselves. www.auralmusic.com

adg211288 Escape of Pozoj is the second instalment of a trilogy of albums by Croatian avant-garde/progressive black metal act Johann Wolfgang Pozoj. The album was originally released back in 2009 but like the first album in the trilogy, Birth of Pozoj, has now been rerecorded and released in late 2011. Unlike the two versions of Birth of Pozoj which featured noticeable changes just by checking the track lists against each other the new version of Escape of Pozoj features an identical set of tracks, with more or less the same durations. I would hazard a guess that this means the band were more or less happy with the original album, which I haven’t heard, at least on the compositional front.

Unlike the two lengthy compositions that made up Birth of Pozoj what we have on Escape of Pozoj is four times as many tracks but all much shorter in duration, the exception being the closing Prstima Prelazim Preko Tvoga Tijela... which clocks in a thirteen and a half minutes, though this is still pretty far from the times of Birth of Pozoj’s Bellum Omnium Contra Omnes at 33:51 and Queen Emeraldas at 20:45. That’s what it looks like on the tin anyway, since the tracks transitions are so smooth that the end result sounds like a single track lasting a little under fifty minutes.

Escape of Pozoj, like Birth of Pozoj, has not got the most ‘out there’ sound for something described as being avant-garde, in fact for the most part I’d rather label Johann Wolfgang Pozoj’s music as progressive rather than avant-garde. The music is in the same vein as Birth of Pozoj, which means some traditional black metal rawness to the guitars but with some riffs that don’t really fit the black metal mould and inclusion of ambient parts, which start off the album in this case. The ambient parts are one of the best features in Escape of Pozoj in my opinion, successfully creating a dark atmosphere for the music better than the raw riffs and black metal growls.

As a thematic sequel to Birth of Pozoj Escape of Pozoj succeeds in sounding like a direct continuation of the first album, and I expect the currently forthcoming final instalment Return of Pozoj will do the same, making them sound like one really long album. The quality of Escape of Pozoj is totally on par with Birth of Pozoj to the point that I really can’t call which of them is the superior album. That means that Escape of Pozoj is a solid release that I expect will have a wide appeal among metal fans. I’m not looking forward to hearing the final instalment of the trilogy, Return of Pozoj, the only one of the three than has not been released before, which is currently slated for a 2012 release.

(Originally written for Heavy Metal Haven, scored at 8.4/10)

UMUR "Birth of Pozoj (Trilogy Part 1)" is a completely re-arranged and re-recorded version of Croatian experimental extreme metal act Johann Wolfgang Pozoj´s debut full-length studio album "Birth of Pozoj (2007)" and as the title suggests the first part of a triology. The album was released in May 2011 by Code666. Both part one and two ("Escape of Pozoj (2009)") were originally independently released in very limited number of copies but the band were picked up by Italian label Code666 and offered a deal to re-arrange and re-record the first two albums and of course also to release the third part of the triology when that is finished.

The music on "Birth of Pozoj (Trilogy Part 1)" is rooted in black metal, but the music is by no means "regular" sounding black metal. There are as many progressive, ambient, atmospheric and goth rock/ metal (I´m detecting a Moonspell influence here) elements in the music as there are black metal elements. The vocals are occassionally raspy and raw but lead vocalist Ivan Borcic also whispers, talks and sings using a clean voice.

"Birth of Pozoj (Trilogy Part 1)" only features two tracks but they are respectively 33:51 and 20:45 minutes long and not surprisingly progressive in structure. Some parts seem to be repeated but not many and the two tracks very much feel like developing tracks rather than a bunch of shorter tracks put together to form longer tracks, which isn´t an unusual way of composing longer tracks. That ends up being both an intriguing feature but also an issue as very few of the sections are memorable and too many sections become repetitive or simply overstay their welcome. I miss intense emotions, power and conviction. The band obviously have many great ideas but they are simply not executed very well.

...much has to do with a rather tame and powerless sound production though. I´m a bit amazed that the band went through all that work to re-arrange and re-record the album and ended up with a production that honestly sounds a bit amateurish. Call it organic and authentic but I´m not impressed. Add to that the fact that at least one of the guitars are out of tune, this just comes off as sloppy.

So all in all there are several features on "Birth of Pozoj (Trilogy Part 1)" that I´m not too happy about, and I can´t say it´s an album I´ll take out very often for listening pleasure. Viewed upon objectively it´s not a complete failure though and especially the band´s adventurous approach to songwriting is something I appreciate. Before I´m hooked they will need to write more memorable material, tune their guitars and pursuade Code666 to pay for a better sound production for their next album. A 2.5 star rating is warranted.

J-Man In light of their recent signing with prestigious metal label code666, Croatian avant-garde black metal act Johann Wolfgang Pozoj has decided to re-record their debut full-length album, Birth of Pozoj. Rather than simply remastering the album for the release, the band has "re-arranged, re-thinked, and re-recorded" Birth of Pozoj, as they intend on soon doing for the rest of the "Pozoj trilogy". Although I am currently unacquainted with the rest of the band's material - including the original version of Birth of Pozoj - I do know that this is one damn good album, and surely among one of the more impressive avant-garde black metal releases I've heard recently. This album consists of two exceptionally long songs, one exceeding the 33-minute mark, yet it remains interesting the entire time through. Birth of Pozoj is one of the most unique black metal albums I've heard in a long time, and people who enjoy black metal on the more progressive and experimental side should find plenty to love here.

Johann Wolfgang Pozoj really defies characterization on this record. Although you could say it's rooted in black metal, the clean vocal sections, progressive song structures, varied instrumentation, and ambient portions really make this a tough one to pin down. I'll stick with a loose "experimental black metal" tag, but even that isn't doing them much justice. Birth of Pozoj is a truly unique album, and the fact that it also manages to amaze with its tremendous compositions as well is admirable. Although I'd say the near-34 minute "Bellum Omnium Contra Omnes" is slightly more interesting than the near-21 minute "Queen Emeraldas", both are beautiful songs that serve as stunning rides through the darkest depths of human emotion - and there are plenty of awesome riffs here too, by the way. Birth of Pozoj will take quite a few listens to "sink in", but it's a really remarkable observation once you give it the attention it deserves. I wouldn't let the long compositions and weird, dissonant riffs scare you away after first listen.

One small complaint of mine about Birth of Pozoj is related to the production. Although not detrimental, it sounds a bit thin to these ears, and the occasional technical "hiccup" - most likely related to the quality of my promo copy - doesn't help either. The retail version may sound higher quality than the version I'm listening to, but there's no way for me to judge that right now.

All in all, Johann Wolfgang Pozoj really ended up exceeding my expectations with Birth of Pozoj. The band's unique take on avant-garde black metal is remarkable, and the way they manage to portray this through beautiful songwriting and varied instrumentation makes this one a winner on nearly every front. If you have eclectic tastes when it comes to black metal, I'd say this is a highly-recommendable purchase. 3.5 - 4 stars are very well deserved, and I'll be extremely curious to hear where Johann Wolfgang Pozoj takes this intriguing trilogy in the future.

The Block “The Birth of Pozoj” was Johan Wolfgang Pozoj’s first album that the band released in 2007. The most recently they released another album titled the same way and featuring two songs from the earlier album: “Bellum Omnium Contra Omnes” and “Queen Emeraldas”. The only difference is that is was totally re-worked and re-recorded, so it was basically a completely different album.

Since this album only has two songs many people would believe that it would be relatively short. If I were to tell them it’s longer than a 10 track album they would think me insane, right? Well it is. Featuring a 20 minute song and a 30 some minute song, this album is almost an hour long! Originally the band had 5 songs on the first release but cut it down to two, and I quite like that since I don’t know if I want to sit through almost two hours of atmospheric black metal. Now onto what people actually want to know about, the music.

“The Birth of Pozoj” is a completely atmospheric black metal album which features great playing and wonderful dark passages. “Bellum Omnium Contra Omnes” is a great song, and has very good flow to it. Starting off slow and deep it eventually builds and builds to a monster of a song. You can really tell the almost avant-garde approach to this album in this song especially, and sometimes the conflicting time signatures are really cool. When the growls come in there is a nice change in the music and the guitar riffs become shorter and more prevalent. The growls are exceptional, especially mixed with Marko Balaban and Filip Fabek’s guitar playing. The end of “Bellum Omnium Contra Omnes” is probably my favorite part of the album because of its dark and rich guitar riffs.

The last song, “Queen Emeraldas” starts off much more upbeat but soon transfers back into the dark tones that ended the first song. The growls on this song are also very well preformed by Ivan Borcic. The production of this album isn’t really polished, but at the same time it isn’t that raw style that some may expect from black metal.

“The Birth of Pozoj” is a wonderful album that any fan of Burzum, or older black metal will enjoy thoroughly. Featuring great guitar playing, and very good growls Johan Wolfgang Pozoj have definitely found their way to the top of black metal with this release which gets 3.5 stars from me.