Heinrichreich / Taranis – Ancient Will CD
Two leaders, two bands / projects /, both try to play it old school early 90’s Black Metal. Jorg Heinrich and Bjorn Desmet are running both their shows with ability but since their will went towards the old ways, why was the quality issue left behind? Presenting their latest joined effort , Ancient Will.
Heinrichreich
The Irish / Slovakian from Balyllean, Ireland, Jorg Heinrich began his project in 2007, handling all the instruments instead of the bass and small instruments. His style is old school Black Metal in the vein of the early raw Norwegian Black Metal scene with influences from bands like early Darkthrone, Emperor and Immortal. You can say he is doing it Falkenbach but without the Folk Metal musical elements, just the lyrical themes like Paganism and old Irish and Slovakian heritage. In Sep’ 2007 he released a demo named, Ein Reich , which featured the same songs that were collected for this split.
The production, handled by Heinrich, is, maybe intentionally, very poor sounding. There are some holes in it and the major ones are in the mastering section. There are instruments that receive too much volume in various sections and the result is the fading of other instruments. For example: the second track, “Forward To The Immortality” , although it starts out very good, the guitars almost totally overpowers the drums. And that is not the only track this sort of thing happens on. Even old and raw Black Metal acts such as Immortal in their 1992 album, Pure Holocaust, were able to avoid this sort of thing. Another small thing comes, again, in this same track. In its beginning there are these five annoying squeaks that sound like microphone trouble or too much gain.
As for Heinrich’s material, his writing is suitable for this sub-genre, both musically and lyrically. He tries to create various lead guitar riffs a'la old school Black Metal. Some of these riffs are very good and along with some lead bass lines they are the saviors of some tracks in his share of the release. But there are tracks that these riffs, pretty much, resemble each other just in a different scale. For example: “Poison In The Vein” and “My Journey To The Fantasy”. One of the good things that surround Heinrich’s release is the diverse bass lines that are mixed with some measure of melody.
Heinrich’s abilities to handle, almost all the roles of a band, are quite impressive. Overall he managed to succeed in his mission to make an old school release. His assistance came from the bass guitar section, handled by the Slovakian, Mathornor Mrtwosh, who is in charge of the melodies of the bass. The small instruments like bodrahns, whistles and pipes are handled by Heinrich’s wife Linda. Heinrich demonstrates some nice vocals abilities but these are very much the same as other Black Metal acts, even in today’s Black Metal scene.
Heinrich presents fine songs, but because of various similarities between them, some lose interest pretty quick. The good ones will get their deserved credit. “Forward To Immortality” is a good track with a catchy, morbid melody a'la old school Black Metal. Also there are these cool lead bass lines. “Ancient Will” is an early 90’s Black Metal song, a very solid one with great vocals. “Teutonic Forest” is another impressive one, especially in the melody section, but it has some annoying parts near its end as well.
Label: Iron Age Records – IRON003
Country: UK
Media Condition: Near Mint (NM or M-)
Sleeve Condition: Near Mint (NM or M-)