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Striborg > Embittered Darkness / Isle de Morts > Reviews
Striborg - Embittered Darkness / Isle de Morts

As always, nearly impossible to get a bead on - 74%

Noktorn, June 11th, 2011

Striborg: the Jandek of black metal?

Ugh, no, I got a douche chill just writing that. Still, as Aquarius as that invariably sounds, there's some credibility to the comparison; Striborg's grumbling, hermetic, untuned sound comes from a seemingly familiar place, albeit one more concerned with misanthropy and trees than lost love and mourning. The odd position Sin Nanna occupies within the greater black metal scene doesn't help; far too bizarre for the average Darkthrone fan, and yet somehow still too strange and deadly serious for even the hipsters. Yeah, they might like buzzy, droning, lo-fi, minimal stuff, but they don't like it so much when it's decrepit, wandering, and gnarled rather than warm and shoegazey.

If you've heard a Striborg release, you have a basic idea of what this sounds like, since the project's general musical frame of reference was established early on and doesn't really tend to budge from that position. Long, harshly buzzing tremolo riffs which twist and climb like some sort of jungle vine strangling the life out of one of the larger trees, a particularly nasal, ornery style of vocal delivery that doesn't so much scream as mumble and snarl and intonate, and drums that seem to be everywhere and nowhere at once, stumbling and bumbling like a rocky, unpaved road under the 'melodies' (if you could call them that.) 'Embittered Darkness,' the first release on this disc, is only a mild departure from Striborg's standard mode. This album finds Sin Nanna's music a bit slower and more open, not soaked in claustrophobic blasting and noise like so much of his other work, and instead opening up a bit too more involved melodies and aural space. Which isn't to say it's any less uncomfortable than normal; Sin Nanna has a particular ability to write riffs that feel rhythmically and melodically wrong but still somehow manage to arrive at a certain archaic, weather-worn atmosphere. Striborg's music sounds old. Sin Nanna's playing sounds old. And on 'Embittered Darkness,' they sound more than ever ready to sluggishly collapse into a shallow grave at any moment.

'Isle De Morts' is a simpler and weaker beast. An older Kathaaria release rebranded under the Striborg name, the ten short tracks which compose its running order show off Striborg's earliest origins as something of an Ildjarn worship project. The tracks are fast, noisy, and grimly punk, with a perpetual cascade of sloppy blast beats and noisy tremolo riffs and shrieks filling up the listener's ears with what borders on a square wave at times. There's some novelty to it, yeah, but ultimately it goes on for longer than it needs to and it doesn't carry any of the subtlety of the previous album- it's a purely historical curiosity.

More on 'Embittered Darkness': Striborg experiments more than usual with slightly consonant melodies on tracks like 'Wrapped in a Cocoon Out of Harm's Way,' where the ugly, Heirdrainish opening melodies slowly but surely morph into something that could almost be related to the very oldest material by Burzum. This is helped along by the preponderance of clean guitars and synths which fill the short interlude tracks which make up half the tracklisting for the album. They're melodic, yes, and at times almost seem to go in a predictable manner- but, as always, Sin Nanna twists them to the sort of shamanistic, anti-human non-resolution that he's mastered throughout his long catalog of music. Though I'd be hard pressed to describe any Striborg release as 'accessible,' 'Embittered Darkness' comes closer than any of them I suppose.

Get this for the first six tracks and throw the rest on from time to time; though they're clearly outmatched by the initial volley of 'Embittered Darkness,' the others are worth a look or two from raw black metal fans. Purchasing this is a pretty simple matter: you either get Striborg or you don't, and none of his albums will convince you more than any other. Still, I'm inclined to say that this one is a bit more bearable than many others; check it out and see for yourself.

The second to worst album I've ever heard. - 8%

giganticbrain, August 7th, 2008

Striborg... a band I have always been familiar with and have forever related with pure misanthropy. But I cannot say that Striborg is really all that good, especially with this album. This album reflects all the qualities of Striborg that show how little talent Sin Nanna has. I strongly believe he has the right intentions, and a few of the right resources, but nowhere near the musical talent, and all the needed resources.

Of all the songs on this album, the only really "good" tracks are the following: "Protagonist of Misanthropic Virtues", "In The Eerie Pre-Dawn Silence Of The Cold", and "Wrapped in a Cocoon out of Harms Way". The rest are either static, or just too horrible to mention.

One of the more humorous tracks on the album is Embittered Darkness. First, the name sounds like its trying way to hard to be black metal. Second, the minute it starts playing, it sounds like an angry swarm of mosquitoes. Seriously, if mosquitoes could make "music" this is what it'd sound like. Thirdly, the guitars sound out of tune, and he's playing notes that don't go together, and just sound completely horrible. I don't know if he's trying to go for the "terror mosquitoes" sound, but he's definitely achieving it. Fourthly, he does not know how to operate his echo software, or whatever the hell he uses. He uses it for he vocals and it sounds too electronic to be considered normal, and sometimes I think he'd achieve better results by going out into the forest with a cassette tape and screaming his misanthropic and nihilistic heart out (if the dude even has a heart).

Many songs are like this one, in fact, I could say almost all of his "black metal" tracks are like this. His ambient ones are a little better, but they still are unbearable to listen to. Also, many times in his black metal songs, his drums are off beat, and stop, and then pick up again. Maybe thats his recording equipment doing the skipping, but I seem to think that its just Sin Nanna trying to get back on beat.

Overall, the album was awful. I have no idea how Striborg has been actually signed to a record label. I think it's about time that Sin Nanna gave up the whole black metal thing. In fact, he should have never started.

POBDZ: Striborg's doomiest album - 80%

vrag_moj, May 15th, 2008

What I like about this album is that although it is not as eccentric as Striborg’s earlier output, it is very focused. There are only 4 songs-proper here, long songs, but they all have a sense of progression about them, that takes them from introduction to climax in a though-out manner that is sometimes not present on earlier recordings. This album is not the hit-and-miss brilliance mixed with utter badness of earlier works, although it’s probably not his best. Praise be to Cronos, there are no noticeable timing mistakes here, which spoiled some great moments for me previously.

It is still a Striborg work – flailing the trademark dystrophic guitars, although their tone has some body and grit here that is quite pleasing; shrill vocal blur and boxy but precise drums. Most of all, that shimmering dissonance pervades every riff as the phrases change dramatically and the songs march though bleak soundscapes towards apocalypse. Also, I believe the tuning here is very very non-standard, adding some strangeness to this already strange music.

After the excellent, bizarre first song the album settles into the morose droning routine one would be familiar with having heard its like in Striborg before, until we reach the lastr performance. The music here slows down to a funerary pace and that is something I don’t think Sin-Nanna tried before…and it sounds great! Darkness! The album ends on a brooding, soul-less note with chanting vocals and thick (for Striborg) guitars, drawing the work to a devastating closure.

My Southern Lord copy also includes the outstanding “Isle De Morts” demo from 1997. Blistering, raw black metal that I have reviewed elsewhere.

Originally published in Procession of Black Doom zIne #1

Pretty hilarious - 10%

Tenebrious, November 14th, 2007

Okay, I don't know much about this band. I barely heard of them/it/him, whatever. Well anyway, I saw the page on here and saw the picture of the man behind this "music" which gave me a hefty laugh. He looks plenty ridiculous, even compared to Immortal. It's pretty pathetic.

Anyway, on to the music. Well, the album starts off with a seemingly eerie bit of some guitar and synths but is completely ruined by the Fisher Price sounding keyboard part. It seriously sounds like it was sampled from some children's toy. I can't take the album seriously from this point on. And then the next track starts off with some awful sounding buzzing guitar that seems like it's being played through an amp that is about to break. It sounds fucking awful. The riff is decent, I'll say that much.

The vocals suck shit. They are seriously awful. They sound like an annoying little gremlin or something. Actually, they sound vaguely like Donald Duck. They don't sound grim or dark, just pathetic and hilarious.

The "ambient" parts of this album are just hilarious. They sound like they were ripped off of some cheesy 80's horror film. Awful and very uninteresting.

Then there is the so called second half of this album. This is where it starts to get hilarious. You can't hear the guitar in most of the songs. The guitar! How can you make an album in a genre of music where one of the most prominent instruments is almost completely unheard? The drums sound sloppy and fast. Nothing impressive and consist of blast beats most of the way. Obviously this guy spent very little time on them. It seems that he just recorded some random blasts and put them to his tracks. The vocals are surely pathetic. Easily the worst I've ever heard. They sound so stupid that I'm actually highly embarrassed listening to this and they are actually louder than everything else.

Basically, if you haven't heard this band, you aren't missing much, or at least don't start with this album. Pure crap.

Striborg has come a long way in 10 years - 80%

NausikaDalazBlindaz, March 12th, 2007

Six new songs making up "Embittered Darkness" are combined here with an older 1997 recording "Isle de Morts" consisting of 10 songs. The "Embittered Darkness" section opens with a funereal all-instrumental piece combining acoustic guitar and powerful droning synths and then gets down to serious business in "Wrapped in a cocoon out of harms way" with the Striborg trademarks of lightweight buzzing guitars in the background and strong percussion work pounding out rhythms that lead the way. Sin-nanna's singing is more up-front in the mix here than on some of his previous albums and there is not much echo on it. As ever, he rails against humanity and the damage done to Nature by people over the centuries, and he yearn to merge with the trees and shadows of the Tasmanian forests.

Half the songs featured on "Embittered Darkness" have no lyrics and two of them features acoustic guitar playing with some surprisingly catchy and tuneful if rather doleful melodies, this is a new departure for Striborg. The third all-instrumental piece, "In the eerie pre-dawn silence of the cold", is a repetitive synth dronescape which sticks out like a sore thumb in this section as Striborg relies less on keyboards here than on earlier albums and any synth work you hear tends to be fairly low-key and often droney.

The title track is notable for the continuous hornet guitar buzzing, ponderous drumming with off-kilter beats and Sin-nanna's snarling vocals dripping with acid venom. The last track, "Digging a ditch to die in", follows in a somewhat similar vein and doesn't sound greatly different apart from the spoken-word bit at the end; lyrics here are more direct and personal than is usual for Striborg and you can actually hear Sin-nanna's enunciation fairly clearly though having the printed lyrics still helps.

The "Isle de Morts" part opens with blizzards, pealing church bells and some creepy background organ music. The songs are a lot shorter and more punky and aggressive, and Sin-nanna's voice tends to be growly. His drumming is a lot more primitive with stacks of blastbeats reaching impossible sound-barrier-breaking speeds. Guitars are backgrounded but there's definite riffing going on so at this point Sin-nanna was not using them as an ambient backdrop. The production is crude and seems uneven: on some songs the drums and vocals are really loud while the guitars seem distant so the music can have a bit of a cartoon-punk quality, and then there are other songs where the guitars are quite loud but Sin-nanna's voice nearly disappears beneath. Most songs don't seem all that different from each other: drums thrash away, guitars buzz and Sin-nanna mostly speaks the lyrics throughout each track when and wherever he sees fit.

It's quite a long recording but at least North American listeners get the chance to hear Striborg as it is now through "Embittered Darkness" and as the act was many years ago through "Isle de Morts", thanks to the Southern Lord label distribution. I don't think the songs in the "Embittered Darkness" section are very much of an advance over previous Striborg recordings: true, they are not as long as some of Striborg's other songs have been but then they are a bit less trancey and eccentric. I hope Sin-nanna has not got stuck in a rut but time will tell if he has or not. The acoustic guitar music is a very nice melodic touch and hopefully he can integrate it with the keyboards into the music on future releases.

When you hear an album like this, you can really appreciate how far an artist like Sin-nanna has come in 10 years while faithfully maintaining his idiosyncratic approach.