“Welcome to a new chapter of Century Media Death Metal” proclaims the press sheet, written by the label that in the early 90’s released legendary albums from such bands at Asphyx, Unleashed Grave, Morgoth and Tiamat; a crucial era of breakthrough for the Death Metal genre. Century Media have since gone on to publish some of the worst metal bands of all time for about two decades (with a few noteworthy exceptions that is), finally picking up Sonne Adam leading from some buzz in Rock Hard Magazine’s demo-section.
Anyhow, Sonne Adam (“Hate Humanity” in Hebrew, apparently) has been the name on everyone’s lips in recent days: An unknown Tel Aviv-ian duo with the goal of playing “death metal in the vein of early Paradise Lost but with a more shamelessly evil and blasphemous touch and some Morbid Angel thrown in the mix.” The band also state that their great admirers of the sound of Paradise Lost’s Gothic album (although they sound closer to their debut) and that Morbid Angel’s “God of Emptiness”, in particular, influences all their material. The band’s main-man Davidov states: “God of Emptiness" from Morbid Angel is a huge influence on my writing as it has the most mind blowing riffs that I heard as well as well-crafted drums and amazing vocals in my eyes. I can't count the number of time that I sat down to compose and said to myself "Oh yeah man, this will be our "God of Emptiness" song" (no clean vocals here though). The band also state what they aim to finally fulfil the potential of the 90’s Doom/Death movement, which for them it never did back then.
Besides of these influences, it cannot be denied that Sonne Adam sound a lot like Germany’s Occult Death/Doom masters Necros Christos. The vocals are sung in a similar low and powerful fashion, the riffs and pace (ranging from slow to middle-paced) are pretty damn similar, as well as some of the album-flow including temple-like moments (‘Solitude of Death’, the end of ‘Through Our Eyes Hate Will Shine’). I do not want to use this comparison as negative criticism, but as the Century Media press-sheet babbles on and on about Sonne Adam being so fresh and original it starts to really bug me as the listener. This band has not invented anything new; they’re not some sort of revelation, not some sort of innovators of the Death Metal wheel. What Sonne Adam does though, is write extremely good Doom/Death Metal. Song structuring, for the most part, is very rewarding (although sometimes a bit repetitive) and the riffs/vocal patterns are a joy to any fan of the genre.
The guitar sound is another thing that’s worth mentioning. It comes as a surprise as the album starts with a riff that reminds me of old Saint Vitus or Pentagram; not what you’d expect from a Death Metal album. However, the organic and warm downtuned guitar tone makes perfect sense with these songs. The album also starts up with their ‘hit’ song ‘We Who Worship the Black’, which is bloody catchy and welcomes the listener into Sonne Adam’s realm from the very start. The brief and well-structures use of keyboards also add a lot to the album. What we have is just the right kind of dark and sinister atmosphere that needed for these songs to reach their full potential.
The album consists of eight full songs and is almost 36 minutes long, which is a good length for an extreme metal album as far as I’m concerned. Apparently it took three months to write the entire piece (working day and night), something I’m always very sceptical about. But a lot of attention has gone into detail, so clearly nothing has been rushed. Although I find the album sometimes lacks some bite (especially towards middle/end), but is always quick to pick up again as the listener discovers new elements through numerous listens.
So with 2011 shaping to be a very strong year for extreme metal, with bands having to raise the bar in order to justify their existence, where does Sonne Adam stand? I would conclude that they stand right up there with the best, notwithstanding that they ain’t the most innovate band ever (they don’t need to be!). Despite arriving at the exact time as many are jumping onto the Death/Doom bandwagon, Sonne Adam manage to deliver such a high quality release to elevate them way above the trendies. However, I feel we haven’t seen the best of them yet and I sincerely hope that the major label interest will not influence their future output.
http://www.myspace.com/sonneadam
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Sonne-Adam/295451827227
