Asmodeus/Thule - Split demo 1997

Asmodeus (Iceland)/Thule (Iceland) - Split demo 1997
Side Asmodeus:
1) Beneath the Burning Sky
2) Satan's Insignia
3) Goat Baphomet
4) The Darkened Moonstruck Night
5) Sorcerer's Spell
6) The Book of Leviathan (The Black cover)
7) Invocation to the Demons and Infernal God (+Outro)
Side Thule:
8) Inn Í Eilífðina
9) Guð Er Lýgi
10) Þegar Tunglið Er Fullt
11) Í Röngum Heimi
12) Ætt Úlfa
13) Trúfrelsi
14) Rottur
15) Myrkviður - Víg Mitt
16) Blackfog - Fire

Updated.

About time to post some more black metal, this time from Iceland. Another tape I bought from one of the distros in late 90's. This split demo is more like a compilation of both bands' work, with Asmodeus' songs 1-3 recorded live in June 1997 and remixed in Studio Hemra in November 1997 during the recordings of tracks 4-6. 7th track is again live, from April 1997 and remixed in May. Thule's part is studio, songs 1-3 recorded in Teppaturninn in May 1997, 4 & 5 in August 1996 in Hellirinn and tracks 6 & 7 September 1995 in Studio Stef. The bonus tracks by Myrkviður & Blackfog were supposed to be teasers from their upcoming demos but as far as I know they were not released or were mega-über limited and distributed only in Iceland or something. I presume they were projects by either bands' members. Thule's songs have been released on a CD by Blackmetal.com so you should probably check that release out. They eventually evolved into Potentiam.

The music presented is black metal, raw and underground with a distinct Scandinavian feel to it. Asmodeus sounds slightly more brutal while Thule is cold and atmospheric. Myrkviður's song is slow in tempo and lenghty while Blackfog's is shorter, faster and generally more necro. Personally I prefer the Thule material here. Recommended and get the Thule "Anthology"!

Cruachan - Celtica demo 1994

Cruachan - Celtica demo 1994
1) To Moytura We Return
2) Maeves' March
3) Cúchulainn
4) Battle Frenzy
5) The Voyage Of Bran
6) To Invoke The Horned God
7) F.M.C.D.A.C.A.K.A.F.G.H.
8) Scéal Na Fianna (live)

Depositfiles

I enjoyed this demo quite a lot when one of my tape trader comrades recorded it to me in 1995, but was somewhat dissappointed with the debut album released on Nazgul's Eyrie. In a fit of nostalgy I downloaded a version of the demo from one of the various blogs but to my dissappointment it was at 128 kbps, sounded pretty weak and was incomplete. So I decided to rip my own tape - which has the disadvantage of being a 3rd or so generation dub and suffers from massive tape hiss. However, I'm pretty satisfied with how it turned out, managed to eliminate the worst of the hissing without much damage to overall sound. Bullshit! UPDATE: I'm not at all satisfied with the old rip! So I ripped it again & re-uploaded. I also found better scan(s) of the covers which are included.

As for the content itself, this is Celtic pagan (black) metal with at times great raw vocals, endearingly clumsy clean vocal, pipes, melodic and very folky instrumentation. The sound is typical of the demo tapes of the time, audible bass is noteworthy, guitars are a little too low and the vocal is high on the mix. Songs vary from very short to epic lenght, at times a little too long for their own good I admit. Not much else to say, take a listen at Cruachan's rough past.

Haven In Shadows - Legend Of The Wolf demo 1995

Haven In Shadows - Legend Of The Wolf rehearsal demo 1995
1) Haven In Shadows
2) Legend Of The Wolf
3) Untitled I
4) Gazing Upon Distant Shores
5) Untitled II

Reuploaded

Haven In Shadows, later renamed simply Shadows, was a side project of Wanderer/Raven/etc man Vindasyl, playing dark and doomy metal plodding away mostly at mid-tempo. He recorded me this rehearsal/demo tape along with material from his/their various other projects back in the day. I can't seem to find the piece of paper with the track listing for this one but I recall the Metal Archives titles seem to be correct so we'll go with 'em for now.

As a word of warning: this reheasal demo is completely instrumental. It has a good rehearsal sound though and at least I enjoy the songs, vocals or no. Atmospheric stuff, has a certain heathenish air to it too I think. Recommended for people who do not miss the vocals too much, or who like to sing to their mp3s.

Nihili Locus - ...Advesperascit... 1994

Nihili Locus - ...Advesperascit... demo 1994
1) Gloomy Theatre Of Ruins
2) Canto (Of A Nightly Jewel)
3) Dance Of The Crying Soul
4) ...Advesperascit...
5) Buio
6) XII Touches
7) Tectum Nemoralibus Umbris

Reuploaded

Italian atmospheric death/black/doom/something metal. Not so easy to define, but it's atmospheric and dark stuff, very good and has that obscure, occult feeling many Italian bands manage to capture. Think about Opera IX, Mortuary Drape, Death SS and the like. I ordered this one directly from the band in 1995 after seeing a flyer which sparked my interest. I don't remember anymore what was so special about the flyer, probably the name and the Christopher Szpajdel drawn logo was enough. They had released a 7" EP in 1992 and a MCD after this tape and then apparently split up, only to reform recently. See their MySpace page for (very little) information.

There are 3 "proper" metal tracks, 2 shorter instrumental pieces and 2 tracks that fall into intro category, but the metal songs are quite lenghty, fear not. Sound is good and quality too, I ripped it from an original pro demo tape.

EDIT: Badongo link seems to have expired so I removed it. Not bothering to replace it. If additional link is needed, ask for it.

Raven (Finland) - Promo 1998

Raven (fin) - Promo 1998
1) Quiet These Paintings Are
2) Outro

Reuploaded

This is the other, and only official, Raven tape. It was released in 1998 just before they changed the name to Shape Of Despair, after signing with Spinefarm. I'm not sure if ripping and uploading this one goes against my self-appointed policy as it was released on CD as part of "The Eerie Sampler" back in... 1999? But since that disc isn't exactly readily available these days and Eerie Productions is (as far as I know) dead and gone too I thought what the heck, go for it.

Only one proper song and an outro on this release, but that's a long one and was re-recorded by Shape Of Despair for "Angels Of Distress" too. A little more sophisticated than the demo tape but still slow and heavy.

UPDATE: You might want to download the CD compilation "The Eerie Sampler" instead which is found here.

Raven (Finland) - Alone In The Mist demo 1998

Raven (fin) - Alone In The Mist demo 1998
1) Calls In The Cold Winternight
2) Shadows Beyond A Stone
3) Joining The Gathering Of A New Kingdom
4) Woundheir
5) Alone In The Mist
6) Outro

This version no longer supported, see the more recent post

Some different genre material for change, funereal doom metal from Finland, this is the 1st demo of Raven, pre-Shape Of Despair. This demo, like Metal Archives tells us, was not officially released, only copied for some people. So, no cover. I was one of those people and seems like whoever added the info to MA was not as the song titles were different back then (see above). I actually scanned the little note with the titles instead of the cover - yeah, quite lame I know. Anyways, better than nothing eh?

Music is heavy and suffocating, like people who have listened to Shape Of Despair can expect. Being a demo recording the sound is of course quite rough and there is a little tape imperfection at places. But since you are reading this blog I don't think you'll have a problem with that. It's cleaner than on the 1995 rehearsal tape I have somewhere (instrumental versions of these songs). This was one of the several bands of a group of individuals from Vantaa (at that time) and quite surprisingly (at least for me) the one that got places. I thought Wanderer would get signed. SW has released through Werewolf records the material of Wanderer along with Wintermoon's demo and some bonus tracks so see his site for that, other projects were I Flow In Depths..., With The Winds, Haven In Shadows, Vindasyl, Ainu and so on and on. Most unfortunately did not release proper demos and some not even rehearsal tapes. This one did, so give it a try if you like dark and slow music.

UPDATE: Mediafire link had a corrupt .rar, should be fixed now. 2nd one works.

Ragnarok - Pagan Land

Ragnarok (nor) - Pagan Land demo 1995
1) Intro
2) Pagan Land
3) From The Darkest Deep
4) Et Vinterland I Nord
5) Hammerens Slag
6) Ragnarok

Reuploaded

Another Norwegian demo here, the first full demo of Ragnarok, the X-Ray Studios version to be more accurate. Apparently there were two versions of the demo, one recorded at Haga Studios and the other at X-Ray. I don't know how much the difference would be, having only heard this one... the cover credits Pål Espen of X-Ray for all synths, so I'm wondering if they just added a final touch and the synths to the demo there. Anyways, I'd be curious to hear the other, probably rougher version.

Back to this release, I got it by the usual method of sending a tape + postage to the band back in 1995. I had read of them on some zine or other and decided to give their viking black metal a try... yes, that's what the early releases were. Quite good viking black metal too. Obviously melodic and with folky touches but not so much as to cause a rash. It's very likely you've already heard these songs on their debut album "Nattferd" but here's the demo anyways. Enjoyable stuff.