Sturmwoge

Sturmwoge (’Storm-wave’) is the fourth album of German band Halgadom, released in 2006, and it’s their only album so far to feature only metal songs – their previous releases have either been all acoustic or a mixture of neo-folk and pagan metal, and Sturmwoge’s successor, Heimstatt, is another all-acoustic release. Lead guitarist Frank Krämer is the owner of Sonnenkreuz, which releases Halgadom’s albums, and the band also includes bassist Marcel P., who will be familiar to neo-folk and industrial fans as a member of Von Thronstahl and The Days Of The Trumpet Call, as well as being a live bassist for Austrian experimental project Allerseelen.


After ‘Erhebung’ (‘Exaltation’), an atmospheric intro piece with peals of thunder and sweeping orchestral strings, a savage cry announces the arrival of ‘Neuer Adel’ (‘New Nobility’). Halgadom play surging, powerful yet melodic battle metal, something like Svartahrid, Soulsearch or Thyrfing, with a good balance between clean and growled vocals, and acoustic guitar along with the electric guitar. This is the first album for Halgadom’s new singer Paul, who has replaced Sebastian as vocalist, but it sounds to me like there are at least two singers here, with the bulk of the lyrics delivered in a harsh rasping style derived from hardcore and punk rock, and a deeper death metal growl. (All the lyrics, incidentally, are in German, and the booklet doesn’t provide translations.) And whilst there are some chanted chorus sections, this device isn’t overused, as is often the case with pagan metal. Halgadom’s songs focus on Nordic and heroic themes – not exactly unusual in pagan metal circles, obviously, but they do it with passion and conviction. The band’s sound is dominated by Frank Krämer’s guitar work, which is highly technical and attention-grabbing, often involving high tremolo breaks and solos which soar above the rhythm section. The ten tracks of Sturmwoge maintain a similar tempo, and more variation would be good – maybe more keyboards would add an extra level of interest – but ‘Werdung’ stands out as a great song, beginning with a short drum intro and leading out with a long section of clean-sounding plucked guitar work. The following short instrumental track, ‘Metamorphose’, also uses delicately picked classical guitar. The album has a good, unfussy production quality which allows the individual instruments plenty of separation and breathing space, and the vocals are nearly always clearly intelligible. Closing track ‘Das Ende’ is probably the heaviest track on the album, with a grim, relentless energy and a concentration on the riff rather than fancy solos. Sturmwoge comes very nicely packaged in a digipack with colour booklet, and is well worth checking out for fans of the less ferocious forms of pagan metal.


This review was originally written for Judas Kiss webzine:
www.judaskissmagazine.co.uk