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Basarab > Pride of Older Times > Reviews
Basarab - Pride of Older Times

Basa-Rubbish. - 20%

Perplexed_Sjel, November 1st, 2007

A major complaint of Basarab's music is that it merely exists, it doesn't develop and seemingly has no real desire to move the listener. It whimpers along as if it's scared to express itself and fails to showcase any hidden talents. This much is true. Basarab are a band with potential to produce something special, but for the time being, they're not. In actual fact what we have here is something both incredibly dull and disappointing, but most of all, something so incredibly lifeless it sounds extremely hollow.


Perhaps the idea was to create a form of music which portrays a sheer lack of emotion to the listener, and if so, that much has been achieved. However, such an occurrence in music isn't very appealing. Making music takes a lot of heart and soul. If you're trying to display emotions of negativity, you need just as much emotion packed into as if you were creating something joyful and deliriously happy. Basarab fail to live up to the expectations that the very powerful black metal German scene has created for itself.


Every element of this demo, which is entitled 'Pride Of Older Times', is bordering on poor to average. The greatest shock is perhaps the fact that there is very little to get excited about. Musically, it slithers along the ground hoping that it doesn't become noticed. Well, if Basarab's career continues this way, it will inevitably just that, unnoticed. I found it quite ironic that one of the tracks is entitled, 'Despaired Disappointment' because that is exactly how the listener feels throughout this demo.


A sheer lack of emotion, unless you want to tag the hollowness as true meaning, is striking. Basarab are content to wearily trudge along as if they just have to exist to be good at what they do. How very wrong. Whenever Basarab do decide to put some feeling into their music, it's not very convincing. For a band trying to play a dark melancholic sound, they fail rather miserably when I thought that was a particularly easy emotion to display. Passage after passage of dull rhythmic noise is spewed forth as 51 minutes of unadventurous music is poured out and on to the listener.


The vocals are perhaps the most uninspiring batch of vocals i've ever heard. They, like the entire sound of the demo, are laboured. They lack passion and a willingness to drive the music forward. I've never heard such quite music. The guitars are quite, the percussion is quiet and the vocals are so incredibly quiet, they usually get lost behind the broken wall of dreadful noise. They're fairly monotonous and are awfully pitched. The latter fact wouldn't be so hard to bear if they altered every now and then, but they simply don't. One pitch the entire way through.


The same could be said about every other instrument. It's difficult to pick a standout point as almost every element of Basarab's music is dire. The synths can usually be seen as some sort of saving grace, but they lack an edge. The synth doesn't produce a particularly harsh sound, which black metal fans may be accustomed to. Instead, it's like whispered speech. Very quiet and hard to hear against the backdrop of everything else.