Inspired by the first generation of Norwegian black metal where no keyboards could be found and Dimmu Borgir shone with their absence, four well-known metal musicians from Northern Germany got together and formed Negator last year (2003). There have been countless projects like this one where established musicians form a "band" quickly, often asked by their labels, and then rush through recording one or more albums. Being a German band it is also very easy promoting your album in the major metal magazines as most of them are German speaking. What about 7 out of 7 in Hammer? Is this such a perfect album you probably wonder. Of course it's not. Don't get me wrong here. Negator is good at what they do and "Old Black" is a nice little disc to listen to once in a while but in the long run you realize that it is one in a hundred. The album could win prices for the simplest title though. What Negator want to accomplish is to capture the essence of old-school black metal. This is not an easy task and thousands of bands have tried to do just the same with different amounts of success. You can easily realize that these guys are skilled musicians, having created such an album in less than a year, but it lacks any originality whatsoever and they do not manage to create that unique atmosphere which is needed to measure up with the old legends of the black past. We are offered one surprise though on the album in the form of the melodic folk / viking metal instrumental piece "Interludium" which is rather nice on its own but doesn't fit in at all. A decent album that will probably find its fair share of fans among a very large black metal audience but I'm afraid it will be forgotten very quickly.
written by Vincent Eldefors
|
Tracklist
|
| 1. Science Of Nihil |
|
2. Free Bird |
|
3. Der Infanterist |
|
4. Interludium |
|
5. Katharsis |
|
6. Vernunft 1.0 |
|
7. In The Unholy Halls Of Eternal Frost |
|
8. Renegation |
Playing time: 38.23
