EISREGEN

One of the numerous representatives of the German "dark" scene, who unlike the majority of their (quasi-gothic) colleagues chose a harder edge of darkness. The dark metal the band plays contains all the classic essential ingredients: it is less angry than black metal, less severe than death metal, less depressive than doom metal, and less sorrowful than gothic metal. To this modest set we add a dash of distinctly German character, conveyed through the German language and the precision typical only of Germans (at times bordering on mechanistic), and we theoretically arrive at dark metal from Eisregen. The portrait would be incomplete without the mournfully beautiful keyboard passages (the gothic component of dark metal), magnificent, equally mournfully beautiful melodies, and superb vocals — clean singing, deep growling, and croaking screams — that may not scale new heights of mastery but always sound perfectly appropriate. Overall, a very, very interesting release that deserves the attention of all dark metal fans and followers of the German "dark" scene.