Dominion - The Black Domains demo 1996

Dominion - The Black Domains demo 1996
1) Towards the Black Horizon
2) Embraced by Flames
3) Ardent Passion to the Liquid of Life
4) Thou Art the Source of My Dreams

Yandex / 4shared

I've been lax with my duties to the Coven this week. It's a bit late to lament that now so let us move forward with another sending by brother passetiermes, ripped by your humble servant. This is Dominion, yet once again not to be mixed with the plethora of similarily named metal bands, this was a one-man, one demo wonder from Espoo. Well, as far as we know, that is. Cover scans and a lyrics sheet are included.

Four tracks for almost half an hour guarantees that at least some of the songs are bound to be epic in length if not in content. And sure enough, things kick off with a nine-minute monstrosity with synths sounding like old COF with demo sound. By now you realise it might be a prudent idea to flee, even if the track titles weren't already arousing your suspicions. But hey, old COF is kind of fun every now and then, isn't it? The intro part seems to go on and on, however. In reality it takes only a bit over two minutes and when the song proper starts the first reaction is surprise as the guitar sounds quite raw and promising. Unfortunately right away the drums and vocals join in and things take a turn to worse, the two elements combine somehow annoyingly with the guitar. After a while it either gets better or my ear just grows accustomed to it. I still can't say if I like it or not, but it's definitely not like old COF. Closer to Black Funeral actually. Not very close at all, though. The song manages to both drag on and on and yet still end suddenly. Next two songs are slightly shorter, between five and a bit over six minutes while the last one is again almost nine minutes. Going a bit Bathory there aren't we? This is hard to nail down, really, there are many cool parts and about equal amount of faults. This will probably either grow on me with further listens or turn really annoying soon. You should check this out if you're into Finnish underground stuff, enjoy melodic but still raw black metal or something like that. Almost recommended!?