Battlestorm

Artist: 
Album Title: 
Tempest Of The Orient
Release Date: 
Monday, June 8, 2015
Distribution: 
Review Type: 

Singapore-based act Battlestorm, with Nocturnized members (PS: soon I will come back to a split-LP which includes Nocturnized), were formed about a decade ago. After some demos and a split with Damned Eternal, the band released the full length Demonic Incursion via Japanese Deathrash Armageddon, which sort of was a (relative) break-through for the band on international scale. Later there was another split, this time with Fetid Zombie (also on the Sepulchral Voices-split with higher mentioned Nocturnized), and in 2015 the band did release the EP From Hell.

The band’s first demonstrational recording was Tempest Of The Orient, self-released on CD-r in an edition of 111 copies in 2008. It was recorded at the Deathzone Studio by frontman Hades, and now it got re-issued via one of the sub-labels by Legs Akimbo, Locust Amber Records. It comes in an edition of 50 copies, being 25 in red, and 25 in transparent red. This new edition is one-sided, and contains the four original tracks of the 2008-demo.

After a short warlike introduction, Battlestorm perform rather rhythmic, epic and energetic Deathrashblackmetal, based on melodious riffing and hammering rhythms, and ‘supported’ by powerful and deep screaming grunts. Surpluses are the changes in tempo (there is quite some energy, but all this gets interspersed with fabulous down-tuned decelerations as well) and the fantastic sound quality (rough and unpolished, raw and primal, yet I do prefer this kind of result rather than any clinically polished productions that reeks of fake perfection or narrow-minded hypocrisy). This stuff breathes the core of the scene; it is like listening to some symbiosis of all details that characterised (characterises) the scene in all its glory.

Don’t forget that this stuff is seven years of age. Times change. Evolution is inevitable. The essence remains…

81/100