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Musical Warfare "Return To Abandoned"
2011.08.16
Ukrainian pagan metal outfit Khors has always seemed like a bit of an enigma to me. Despite their heritage — founding members Khaoth and Khorus have played in Astrofaes, Nokturnal Mortum and Hate Forest, among others — these guys seem to be increasingly moving towards the softer side of the genre, especially on their latest release Return To Abandoned. The new album continues the style they displayed on 2008’s mysticism, featuring a keyboard-laden sound that’s heavy on the atmospherics. I felt like Mysticism’s primary appeal was its dichotomy of dark, guitar-driven riffing and the brighter impact of melodic soloing and acoustic passages. That contrast is still present on Return To Abandoned, but the softer elements have started to take on greater importance which seems to dilute the effectiveness of Khors’s sound a bit.
One of the subtle yet noticeable changes present on the new album is its production. While Mysticism felt more guitar driven, Return To Abandoned tones down the guitars to the point where they’re sometimes almost indistinguishable from the keyboards. While this certainly highlights the melodicism of Khors’s compositions, it also tempers the heaviness of the album quite a bit. One other thing that sticks out is the soloing, which is excellent as usual, but on this release the band experiments with different instruments and sounds for the leads, which don’t always work. The keyboard / organ solo in ‘The Fog’ just ends up sounding out of place. The odd instrumentation isn’t to difficult to look past, but it’s too bad since Khors’s melodic solos and lead work are a large part of what make them interesting and unique as a band.
There are still some excellent tracks on this album, starting with the opener ‘Lost Threads.’ Like the one-two punch of the previous album, Return To Abandoned features a brooding intro which gradually and seamlessly builds into the crushing opening riff of ‘Lost Threads,’ which is easily one of the album’s best. Others like ‘The Seas Burn Of Impotence’ and ‘Song Of The Void’ are a great mixture of pagan metal heaviness and dark melodicism. Return To Abandoned’s mix of atmospheric black metal, pagan metal and occasional hints of melodic death metal riffing all add up to a sound that I tend to think of as “black metal lite.” I’m not completely sold on it, but the various comments I’ve seen about the album seem to indicate that I’m in the minority there, so if you like melodic, atmospheric metal you’ll want to give Khors’s latest a listen.
One of the subtle yet noticeable changes present on the new album is its production. While Mysticism felt more guitar driven, Return To Abandoned tones down the guitars to the point where they’re sometimes almost indistinguishable from the keyboards. While this certainly highlights the melodicism of Khors’s compositions, it also tempers the heaviness of the album quite a bit. One other thing that sticks out is the soloing, which is excellent as usual, but on this release the band experiments with different instruments and sounds for the leads, which don’t always work. The keyboard / organ solo in ‘The Fog’ just ends up sounding out of place. The odd instrumentation isn’t to difficult to look past, but it’s too bad since Khors’s melodic solos and lead work are a large part of what make them interesting and unique as a band.
There are still some excellent tracks on this album, starting with the opener ‘Lost Threads.’ Like the one-two punch of the previous album, Return To Abandoned features a brooding intro which gradually and seamlessly builds into the crushing opening riff of ‘Lost Threads,’ which is easily one of the album’s best. Others like ‘The Seas Burn Of Impotence’ and ‘Song Of The Void’ are a great mixture of pagan metal heaviness and dark melodicism. Return To Abandoned’s mix of atmospheric black metal, pagan metal and occasional hints of melodic death metal riffing all add up to a sound that I tend to think of as “black metal lite.” I’m not completely sold on it, but the various comments I’ve seen about the album seem to indicate that I’m in the minority there, so if you like melodic, atmospheric metal you’ll want to give Khors’s latest a listen.