subversion
Moderator
Trelldom- Til Minne
Gaahl- Vocals
Sir- Bass
Valgard- Guitar
Are- Drums
The 2007 face of controversy & internal (band) conflict is perhaps Gorgoroth’s Gaahl. The account for this individual’s plight (among others), given the benefit of the doubt, is how a strict vegetarian was incarcerated for an alleged torture & blood consumption. Upon his release & the opportunity to release Til Minne, the front man got into legal complications with Gorgoroth’s guitar player, Infernus, for the latter’s supposed unprofessional band commitments. All these while recruiting Mayhem’s Hellhammer into the Gorgoroth fold…
Trelldom was put together in 1992, an earlier indulgence for Gaahl prior to his inception into Gorgoroth in 1998. As such, the music propelled by the Trelldom outfit is quite removed from the more malicious Gorgoroth front. Upon hearing Til Minne from the start we note the materials’ more cold & calculative exhibition in tandem with the arctic atmospherics as depicted in the band’s cover sleeve. What you get are mostly sub-5 minute numbers (less the extensive ‘Steg’ which exceeds 10min) whose approach to delivery is devoid of extensive arrangement. The abrasive guitar tones serve as reminder of the band’s black metal roots as some of the slower tunes threaten to deliver the pack into doom’s more cultured territory but not with this signature, jagged vocal veracity. On the issue of vocal delivery, those of us who are bothered by non-English lyrics might question the value of this release’s acquisition.
Til Minne would take the listeners back to the era of Under a Funeral Moon (Dark Throne), where plain urgency was the call rather than the pleasing of masses with indulgent instrumental technicalities. That dark persona is suitably harnessed by baleful frost trauma for today’s generation of black metal associates; not recommended for the easily bored.
Rating: 82%
