Lords of Hypocrisy

Never thought I would define a band using those terms, but man, here we got these five brittons shredding, dooming, beating ala classic and dropping tunes and lyrics that you thought you could ever not find again in the metal world, completely ruled nowadays by the easy bass-beat thrashy riffing. Nothing against that, but finding classical shred mixed in a NWOBHM band with doom power, that's something of a kind.

Yup, there is something magical in this album. Is it a druid spell? We shall never know. But the guitar is completely hypnotic, no more, no less. All the songs are filled with a kinda trademark sound, a weird and tricky distortion which does not, however, leave the album drowning in a dirty final sound as usually happens nowadays with the new bands trying to fill their sound with distortion at expenses of the final sound quality. The noise is very traditional but, in the same time, belongs to our time. The mystical aura is made of beautiful (and dread) almost-accoustic passages into an ordered chaos of doom. Yeah, living the metaphores away, in "Satan's Henchmen", for instance, the effect is mighty. For almost one minute, the intro leads us into a rampant and classically-structured metal piece filled with guitar shredding. And that can't be bad. Not at all. Did I say guitar shredding?? Well, that's what you can find here. Pure metal, doom atmospheres and shred, lots of.

The title song, by the way, "Lords of Hypocrisy", has something enigmatic, as well. Because, when you get to listen the whole album, this track kinda works as a joint, as a leitmotif. In the very end, somehow, this record seems to be, after several listening and picking special attention to the first track, as a conceptual album, at least to some extent. This can be debated, of course. But, being or being not in that way, the complete thing works as a well lubricated machine.

By the way. The bass lines. Dude, maybe they are not something beyond understanding, maybe they are not quite difficult ones, when you listen to then separately. But in the context of all songs, looking into the pieces as a body, not just individually, those bass lines are majestic...

Oh, man, that guitar riff in "The Aftermath"... That finale in "Armageddon"... Pure hypnosis.

"The Lords of Hypocrisy" is a total joy, no matter the genre you like the most. All the songs in it are perfect, polished and well executed. The sound is a bit dirty, maybe on purpose for giving an air of underground-band to the release. I don't have much words for describing this thing, simply, enjoy this classic-sounding doom jewel as soon as possible.

How to describe the sound of Pagan Altar? Although they were part of the NWOBHM movement of the early 80s, their music is really unlike any other band of that period. In a basic sense we have a combination of doomy riffs with elements of traditional metal, but also with a very epic feel that can be largely attributed to vocalist Terry Jones. His unique nasal vocals fit in with the album perfectly, and contribute greatly in giving a sense of emotion to the songs.

The album itself is partially a concept album about nuclear annihilation, but on a larger scale speaks more generally about Mankind's hypocrisy and inhumanity to his fellow man. It really is impossible to pick out any particular song as the highlight: the whole album works as a coherent whole, with a perfect blend of aggressive tracks and softer interludes. Also, there is absolutely no filler to be found here!

Apart from the unique vocals of Terry Jones, the one thing that really sets Pagan Altar above the rest of the competition is their superb lyrics. Many of the tracks here are really not just songs, but also poems... and good ones at that! What other metal bands can you think of whose songs would include verses like:

"A silent world of shapeless things, of torn and twisted form / Man sits amid the wreckage, waiting vainly for the dawn / The glory of Man has come and gone / A broken shattered dream / The only sound to rend the air / Is a stifled, choking scream."

And it's all topped of by the wonderful, classy guitar work of Alan Jones, who shows that soloing with emotion will beat mindless shredding any day of the week. The bottom line of the review is that this album will completely blow you away. So get hold of it as soon as humanly possible!