Primordial — Spirit The Earth Aflame

For a band originally tagged as being Black Metal this eight-track CD sure has a REALLY long playing time , especially if you consider the fact that the opening -intro- title-track lasts only a bit more than a minute, leaving 50 minutes for 7 tracks.

Why becomes obvious from the minute "Gods To The Godless" starts. The band is not about to be rushed into anything, and certainly takes its time to build up a proper atmosphere, and the song itself as well. The moment the vocalist opens his mouth, be prepared to be stunned. Instead of the blistering screams you might expect his voice might perhaps be compared to Vincent Cavenaugh of Anathema-fame. This, together with the at times somewhat lenghthy build-up of the song nudges the band towards the Doom Metal corner rather than the Black Metal one. Until, in the middle of the song, you are surprised once again, because now the very familiar Black Metal screams do blast out of your speakers.

The unorthodox, and at times extremely lenghty build-up of their songs has its downsides as well, though. The mainly slow pace of the songs, and the fact that it takes awhile for the song to make clear where it is heading might turn off more impatient people. Heck, I didn't really care for Primordial when I first listened to the album. Then I got the Hammerheart sampler, on which they have one song (The aforementioned "Gods To The Godless"), and once I got into it, it just grew on me. And even though I now have heard the CD dozens of times over the past weeks, it still grows on me. It even managed to replace the Skyclad CD, which had been residing in my CD-player ever since I got -and reviewed- it, which I think is an achievement in and off itself.

To me the best track on the album would be "The Burning Season". Starting off in a way most remniscient of more 'conventional' Black Metal, and one of the fastest paced bits on the entire CD, instead of being complemented by some furious -and probably expected- Black Metal screams, it features the best vocal part on the CD with lyrics I think truly stunning :"Bring the women and children before meLet us make rivers of their bloodBleed for me... I wish it so"Thoroughly original in its flavour, and definitely very powerful in the images it conveys.

The lyrics as whole seem to focus neither on the stereotypical Satanical stuff, thankfully, nor the more Celtic imagery another Irish band such as Cruachan uses. Yet, in their simplicity, when compared to the lyrics of English bands such as Cradle of Filth or Bal-Sagoth anyway, they are utterly powerful. Not to mention the fact that soon you too will be singing along to them as well.

This being the Digi-pack version, it has an added bonus-track, which some of the Primordial fans out there are sure to recognize "To Enter Pagan". I for one think it a nice enough addition to the album, since it is a good song. Regardless, I must say that it is also the one to blend in the least with the remaining songs on the album.

The production is a very strong and powerful, and most importantly, clear one. (Having been done by a combined effort of Mags [Bal-Sagoth, My Dying Bride and others] and Primordial). The layout is decent enough, though not very shocking. I like the little message written by Nemtheanga about "Spirit The Earth Aflame". It's just one of the things I can appreciate.

All in all, don't hesitate to pick it up, even though on a first listen you might wonder if you'll ever like it. I can almost guarantee it will grow on you as well.