Ride for Revenge - King of Snakes
March 24 2008 at 06:58:28 AM
Finland’s Ride for Revenge is another one of those obscure bands often mentioned due to like, how so totally “unique” they are compared to everyone else (or in some cases, how they sound EXACTLY like everything else, only not really). Praise that nearly every other release coming out of that country seems to be granted almost routinely. But it’s the premium on originality here that leads to such a mess of incomplete ideas as
King of Snakes. To be sure, the album maintains a distinct hodgepodge of sound drifting groggily, elusive behind unseen walls and anchored by the slovenly girth of low-end bass drones. Though present, the guitars remain barely perceptible; the music distinguished more by keyboards producing quasi-psychedelic/horror toned melodies, tribal drums pattering beside “clean” bass guitar and boggy groans recalling the low-fi specter of Beherit. However, even this is not without precedent, sharing certain traits with Finland’s Dead Reptile Shrine, who have veered close to this sort of clumsy, “occultistic Black Metal” before. But here the outcome is altogether more soporific than somnambulant. Which is not to say that one is any more essential than the other. How many bad records do you really need anyway?
[Todd DePalma]
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