Gorthaur - Return to the Truth demo 1995

Gorthaur (spa) - Return to the Truth demo 1995
1) Return to the Truth
2) A Song by the Winter Fire
3) Daughter of the Gods

Yandex / Depositfiles / RGhost

We stick to the sunny Spain but this is an item I actually like. I decided I've had too little black metal here recently. This will be corrected, starting now. Gorthaur was an obscure and short-lived band which either featured members of Beheaded Lamb or was BL after a name change for a while before breaking up & separating into BL and Gothician. Metal Archives reports the events as per latter but I recall a trader comrade giving a different account of the band's background, unfortunately I don't remember what he exactly wrote anymore. As you guessed, this rip of their only demo is from a dub I got from that trader comrade. The reason I hesitated for a long time before posting this is that I actually have two rips of it, the one from my dub posted here and another one, provided years ago by Alhaz of (ex-)Primigenium, at a time I couldn't find the tape. If someone really needs, I can upload his version too, it sounds slightly cleaner. He also sent me the Gothician demo which you should be able to find on the nets. No covers, unfortunately and actually this time nothing else either. Anything would be appreciated, cover scan, band pic/logo, flyer...!

What is the music like you must be wondering by this point. To put it bluntly, it's very Burzum-sounding, raw but melodic black metal. Not really original, the Isengrim editor would hate this, but I never cared about that drivel as long as it works. And it works for me. Not as intense as Nidhoggr (first Burzumish band that came to mind) nor lethargic like the worst depressive black metal projects, Gorthaur operates mostly in midtempo, from the quite brisk pace of the title track to the slightly slower second song and ending up, logically, with the actually slow and quite torturous "Daughter of the Gods". Vocals are shrieks and screams of the Varg-school, naturally, some synths are sparingly used for effective touch here and there and the rest of the musicianship is proficient enough, nothing leaps out to either bother or amaze you. The sound is a bit messy but very listenable by my standards and the little murkiness adds to the appeal of the music, at least I feel like that. I have to admit this gets quite a few nostalgy points from me so I'm not sure how an objective listener, jaded with today's overflowing black metal market and the thousand bands doing/having done similar music, will react to this. And I don't really care. Those who enjoy this do so and the others can again wait for another upload.