Reign in Hell

Quick – looking at the cover of this album, what kind of music would you expect to hear? I think most of us would promptly envision some sort of true/traditional metal, and we’d be absolutely right. Solemnity are sort of like an underground version of Manowar, and for what that’s worth, they aren’t all that bad, either. However, even at just over 43 minutes (including the bonus track) this disc starts to get old, with songs blurring together towards the end. Not a big problem, but don’t expect anything world-changing.

Beyond the Ken Kelly cover, everything about these guys is campy. Goofy names (Sven the Axe?) and songs proclaiming the glory of metal abound. Sure, songs about metal as an entity can be great, but they can also easily turn into cheese-fests. I don’t know, something about the whole delivery here just screams “cheese” to me; perhaps others will find them less so. Regardless, the music on display here is the expected traditional/power metal, albeit with a slight dark-edge (almost thrashy in places). I guess in the sense that Solemnity are going for the whole non-symphonic “Conan the Barbarian” metal style here, things turned out pretty well.

Sven the Axe has a decent set of pipes and uses his limited range to its fullest. I like his more melodic singing voice on songs like “Chalice of Blood”, but he’s by no means a bad vocalist. Actually, in his raspier singing (which is most of the time) he has a bit of old Dave Mustaine in him. His bandmates all grade out about the same – good, not great. The drummer keeps things going at a good pace most of the time, and there’s some great rhythm work to boot. The solos, on the other hand, are nothing special, and the bass just kind of plucks away. You can hear it, for sure, and that’s better than a lot of bands of this sort can say. However, unless you have a truly great bass player, or really innovative songwriting, the bass guitar becomes rather secondary in the recording, and that’s largely the case here.

For a self-production job the sound is surprisingly good. Everything is quite clear and, more importantly, mixed at just about the right levels (meaning the vocals don’t dominate yet aren’t buried seven layers deep). Sven apparently has some experience with this sort of thing, much to the benefit of the band. I’ve heard Solemnity’s follow-up to this disc, and I can’t say that this one sounds any worse than “King of Dreams”. So, kudos to the Axeman for the production job.

The problem I have with this disc is the fact that, aside from the slower “Chalice of Dreams” things really start to sound alike after a couple of listens. The songs certainly are not bad, but few of them really demand your attention as a listener. Plus, throw away the bonus track (an abomination of a “song”) and there isn’t too much here. That fact that things still sound samey doesn’t bode well. But let’s be honest here – we know what we’re getting into when we buy something like this, so I suppose this repetitiveness is ever so slightly less of an issue.

I’m surprised Solemnity aren’t a little more well-known since they are on Remedy Records, a good German label that seems to specialize in this sort of stuff (for example, they have Stormwarrior on their roster). Stormwarrior’s Northern Rage easily beats this album, but if you are at all a fan of true metal then I’d say to give these guys a try anyway. Fans of happier power metal and death/black stuff? Well, this is probably not your cup of tea.