Antiqvam Exqvirite Matrem

Here we have a record from the Spanish Crystal Moors. For a first release is it pretty decent, not really my taste of Metal music, but that is not the point of writing an honest review.

The album contains 9 tracks of folk music influenced Pagan Metal. Screaming vocals varies with clear vocals, some of the songs contain Celtic elements as flutes and chanting, others are more raw and intensive as you find on early Black Pagan Metal records like Behemoth’s first releases. All in all it sounds like most albums of these so called Pagan Metal bands – if you like them you probably will like “Antiqvam Exqvirite Matrem”, too.

A good point with this album is that none of the songs sounds as another, they really created variation in the songs and some nice medieval melodies in between, so you can imagine these Cantabrian barbarians throwing their swords, but for me it is too much of these keyboard hymns and melodic flute / folk music stuff. Another problem is that the complete record sounds as every of the members play for himself and not together as a band. That makes the whole work a little untight and loose and especially the keyboards do not fit into the whole concept in some of the songs.

The lyrics are mainly written in English, others in the Spanish language, but they all seem to deal about old heathen topics of the Cantabrian area.

All in all a decent work, and for those of you who like this kind of folk music influenced Pagan Metal it’s worth to check out if you adore this kind of music or you just got some money over you do not know what to spend on, otherwise I recommend to wait for an upcoming release of these guy on which they might have learned how to play together as a band and tightened up their recorded song material.

CrystalMoors hail from Cantabria in northern Spain, and Antiqvam Exqvirite Matrem is their first full-length release, following a split with Omendark released in 2007. The band was formed in 1995, as a side project to lead guitarist Erun-Dagoth’s main band Eldereon. One album in 13 years seems like a rather leisurely rate of production, although all six members of CrystalMoors evidently belong to numerous other bands as well, so maybe that’s the problem. Of the newer recruits to the band, Faramir makes the most distinctive contribution, playing a variety of acoustic instruments including penny whistle and bagpipes which infuse CrystalMoors’self-styled ‘Cantabrian pagan metal’ with a distinctive seasoning of Celtiberian folksiness.

Antiqvam Exqvirite Matrem contains nine tracks totalling 45 minutes, and it opens with ‘Mons Vindivs’, a short instrumental intro of wistful penny whistle played against a background sound of a splashing waterfall, which segues abruptly into the furious metalstorm of ‘Wrath Of Centvries’, with surging twin guitar leads, rasping death metal vocals, accented with keyboards. It’s also relatively technical, with tricksy time signature changes and an intricate bassline. The production is clean and detailed – this is blackened death metal rather than full-on black metal, with some similarities to German pagan metal bands such as Halgadom and Thrudvangar, or Scandinavians like Thyrfing and Månegarm. Soaring, triumphal guitar leads recall the bombastic battle metal of Turisas, but the closest comparison overall is with Amon Amarth.

The following track ‘Heathenwood’ remains in this fast but polished register, before the restful interlude of ‘Tras La Galerna’, another short whistle tune, with the sound of cracking flames in the background this time. ‘Brotherhood Of The Three Banners’ is slower and more melodic than the earlier tracks, with whistle, acoustic guitars and keyboards leading into chanted harmony vocals, the track as a whole evoking an atmosphere of epic heroism, very much in the vein of Bathory’s Viking metal period (‘One Rode To Asa Bay’, ‘Hammerheart’ etc.). This is the highlight of the album for me.

The last but one track, ‘Ibervs Flvmen’, is entirely folk music, with no metal elements. Whistle, tambourine, acoustic guitar and mouth harp combine to produce a very medieval-sounding piece. The ten-minute epic closing track ‘Lvnarian’ effectively acts as a summary of all the preceding tracks, opening fast and heavy, but sowing halfway through, as a drum and bass section leads into shimmering bar chimes and a melodic interlude, before the veil of enchantment is rent by the metal crashing back in at around the six-minute mark. The flamboyant technical flourishes of this section sound a bit like Emperor, but the track’s last couple of minutes before the fade-out feature skirling bagpipes, re-asserting CrystalMoors’ Cantabrian credentials.

There’ve been a lot of pagan metal bands appearing on the scene in the last few years, but CrystalMoors easily have the chops the songwriting skills and the originality to rise above the mediocre. Let’s hope it doesn’t take another 13 years for the next album to appear. Easily the worst thing about CrystalMoors, though, is that stoopid name. CrystalMoors? Sounds more like a porn star than a metal band, if you ask me.

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

Spanish black/folk metal band CrystalMoors, has decided to grant the world of metal with yet another heathen blessing by releasing “Antiqvam Exqvirite Matrem.” These six barbarians whom are, Uruksoth (Lead vocalist), Erun-Dagoth (Lead, acoustic and rhythm guitars, keyboards, chorus), Faramir (rhythm and acoustic guitar, whistle, melodic vocals, bagpipes, chorus), Thorgen (bass, melodic vocals, chorus), Aernus (keyboards, samples) and Gharador (drums, percussion), play their own brand of Cantabrian pagan metal. CrystalMoors is said to sound like “melodic epic death metal, black metal and Celtic folk music” and let me tell you that this formula is exquisite. They are able to create a Viking theme with not only the lyrics, but with the music as well. The folk combined with the harder black/death metal parts make the perfect soundtrack to a voyage at sea, with new land on the horizon.


Beginning with“Mors Vindivs,” this is a quiet song with only a flute and the sound of a light rainfall. “Tras La Galerna” and “Ibervs Flvmen” play in the same vein, as they are soft interludes of acoustic folk music. A more sprightly song like “Wrath of Centvries,” begins furiously and with a melodic death metal feel. Later on, about a minute and a half in, the folk comes out, blended with a pagan-inspired atmosphere while the keyboards add some symphonic elements into the mix. The vocals are mainly growls, but some screams and clear vocals may be heard as well. “Brotherhood of the Three Banners” is vaguely a mix between Alcest and Amon Amarth, as is much of the album, if one could imagine such a coupling. This is perhaps the most enchanting track, though they’re all mesmerizing. The lovely acoustic intro and the flute playing are majestic and add to that organic feel of the natural wonder that is CrystalMoors. Ten minute behemoth “Lunavarian” contains the entire essence of CrystalMoors, embodying all of the elements the guys bring to the table. This song is just epic.


“Antiqvam Exqvirite Matrem” is the perfect pagan metal album. Every song found on “Antiqvam Exqvirite Matrem” is a masterpiece. One can envision marching across the scenic Cantabrian Mountains with its lush environment. The music is glorious, folk-injected metal, playing like an army of barbarians going to war against your ears, but with enough gentleness to spare your life. The medley of vocal styles and the variety of instruments used, conventional and nonconventional, create this wondrous landscape and transform this album into an adventure.

I’ve heard what CrystalMoors has done on “Antiqvam Exqvirite Matrem” by mixing Celtic elements such as flutes and chanting with some decently produced former black metal a few times already. Certainly it’s a wonderfully updated version of folk music that those who like their music heavy would want to see at the bar of an inn in the middle of a forest in the bands native country, Spain, but it’s really getting to the point where I’m starting to hear a lot of these kinds of bands, and with a lot of bands, the higher the bar gets raised.

What you have on tap from CrystalMoors is certainly a version of black/folk metal that’s grown beyond the black metal roots to include better production, beefier, crunchier guitars, a deeper growl more akin to Amon Amarth. The guitars run through their celtic influence and merge some of them with the good old black metal tremolo picked chords. There’s also those keyboards that attempt to add some background choruses and emulate instruments like flutes, but those said keyboards are cheap, giving a pretty hokey effect to a style of music that’s based on bing so organic.

As far as execution goes, the only real fault is how loose the band plays together, really only needing to tighten up the bolts (after buying new keyboards of course), but if you’re a music fan who’s starting to get their hands on the more popular version of bands in world of folk/metal, you may start to wonder if a new album that sounds this similar, only played so sloppily is warranted.

Originally posted at www.waytooloud.com