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Finnugor > Death Before Dawn > Reviews
Finnugor - Death Before Dawn

Carnivalesque black metal from beyond - 88%

ExPresidents, February 19th, 2005

My first impression after listening to Death Before Dawn was great music, not so great vocals. But after a few listens it began to grow on me and became quite a fantastically original album.

I found this band because I went on a Hungary metal mission, and this is one of the bands that I ran across. The cover art is really cryptic, and the packaging is nice as well. Describing the music is quite hard however, because it is so disparate, and changes quite frequently. I can only say Finnugor defines avant-garde, and is completely out of the norm. The musical element I noticed right off the bat was the crazy keyboards/synths I heard. They utilize very bizzare, carnivalesque keyboards that change tone often, from a kooky organ-grinder sound to a very uplifting, symphonic sound. Make no mistake though, it is as dark as it comes and remains dark throughout the entire album. Death Before Dawn is an amazing track, and when I first listened to it I thought i had heard 4 different songs only to see it was still on the same track! Battle At The Heart Of Dreamland and the 11 minute Astral Fornication are also stand-out songs as well.

Finnugor's musical influences vary, I can tell. The guitars are heavy and very abrasive, and the bass perfectly complimenting the rest of the music. The drums however, play a minor role in most of the music, but do create some charging sounds when they go into on of their bizzare symphony breakdowns. The vocals remind me of early Emperor actually, but this may be because Attila can remind me of Ihsahn sometimes. As much as I hated Gabriel Wolf & Attila's vocals at first, I appreciate them more now because they add to the contrasting sound of the album, even though the vocal production is pretty shitty.

I can think of no band that sounds like them except maybe Arcturus (La Masquerad Infernale-era) but even then they are worlds apart, especially when it comes to vocals and song structure. This band is capable of more in the future, I just hope they work on the drum and vocal production next time. Never the less, this album stunned me and continued every time I listened to it. Definitely recommended for this genre.