Artist: Haiduk
Title: Plagueswept
Type: Demo
Label: Unsigned

One-man melodic black/death metal groups are few and far between, but young Luca Mjolica from Alberta, Canada just happens to be one of those. Young Luca looks like a black metal musician, kitted out in medieval style gear in his promos, as well as eyeliner and snowy forest surroundings (he does look a bit chilly – wearing a jumper really wouldn’t lose any cult points…). The names of the songs are decidedly grim also, with ‘Grom’ and ‘Dark Forest Path’ reminding one of early Satyricon and Behemoth.

But let’s not dwell on what this demo looks like – what it delivers is a rousing bunch of melodic extreme metal tunes, which is not the contradiction you might expect. We do have a decidedly obvious drum machine pumping out programmed blasts and double kick rhythms, but where this album shines is in the guitar department, and this really puts the melodic hook in the blackened tunes. ‘Entering The Lair’ and ‘Grom’ are both prime examples in how headbangingly sweet this genre can be, the latter bordering on a thrashy breed of death metal. On top of mere heaviness, only in the early days of In Flames have atmospheric flourishes and interludes been used with such precision and to such an effect. However, in addition to simple acoustic breaks, we have moods which are delicately staged and built up, ‘Siege’ and ‘Forgotten’ being two prime results of sumptuous, almost neoclassical build-ups.

At only half an hour long, this is hopefully only a taster of what we can expect from this one-man army. A human drummer wouldn’t go amiss, but with ideas of this scale, such an omission can actually be forgiven.

http://www.haiduk.ca