May 212021
 

 

(It is our privilege to bring you this premiere of the experimental and unpredictable new release from Odraza, out tomorrow on Gods Ov War Productions, featuring a foreword by our own Andy Synn)

Ah, Odraza. Now that’s a name I’ve not heard since… well, since just last year, as a matter of fact, when I heaped praised upon their sublime second album, Rzeczom (an album which only just missed out on a place on my “Critical Top Ten” of 2020).

The band’s latest release, however, is even more unique and unusual than its provocative predecessor, comprising as it does a single twenty-minute track, conceived and brought to term as part of an exhibition to be presented at the Museum of Podgórze later this year.

Of course. this isn’t the first time that Odraza have strayed off the beaten (left-hand) path – their 2015 EP, Kir, for example, was a twenty-minute instrumental commissioned and performed live for an event at The Museum of the City of Krakow in tribute to the fallen in the Płaszów concentration camp – but there’s no question in my mind that Acedia is the band’s most unorthodox and unpredictable work yet, as well as a welcome reminder that strange times often breed even stranger art.

Continue reading »

May 182020
 


Uprising

 

(Andy Synn wrote each of the three reviews collected in this post, singing the praises of the new albums by Afsky (Denmark), Odraza (Poland), and Uprising (Germany).)

Black, as we all know, is the best colour.

It’s slimming, effortlessly classy, and goes with pretty much everything. Which I guess is why Black Metal fans are renowned as the sexiest, suavest-looking motherfuckers on the planet…

All joking aside, while conventional wisdom and common consensus seems to be that 2020 has, thus far, been a big year for Death Metal, it’s also been a banner year for Black Metal too, and I’ve already written about several absolutely stunning entries to the canon (for example, here, here, here, and here) that will doubtless end up on many year-end lists.

Well, now I’m about to add three more contenders for the crown to those lists, with the new albums from Afsky (DK), Odraza (PL), and Uprising (DE). Continue reading »