Minas Morgul appears again.
Created in Germany in 1997 by Berserk (drums) and Saule (guitar), the band lived line-up changes and album releases, developing an underground reputation. Jen (keyboards, ex-Menhir) enters the band in 2015, then Janko Jentsch (bass, ex-Riger) and Robse (vocals, Equilibrium, ex-Mallevs Maleficarvm) join the ranks in 2018 before Haffi (guitar) comes in 2019. Together, they compose and record Heimkehr, the band’s seventh album.
Signed with Trollzorn Records since some years already, the band offers a Black Metal with Pagan influences of which gates are opened by Prolog: Sturm aus Ost. A soft but dark introduction that becomes more and more epic until Heimkehr, the eponymous song. Strength, epic sonorities and wild howlings are part of this massive song sung in german, that immediately reveals its heavy and violent influences, like Nierdergang. The composition offers sharp and aggressive leads, sublimated by mystical keyboards that sometimes impose a majestic slowness that fit to screams and drums. Stein um Stein spreads a dark melancholy inspired by Old School Black Metal with unhealthy and vicious sonorities, but also solid and aggressive parts, like Teufel and its oppressive airy ambience.
Weltenfall offers a soft clean sounding introduction before reconnecting with this ancestral and saturated rage, that morphs into an epic run, framed by fast-paced riffs, powerful screams and a solid rhythmic, in opposite to the impenetrable and morbid Totenschiff of which fastness and backing vocals only increase this oppression. The band offers us very Old School tones with this song, then V.F. comes back to majestic and more modern tones with groovy roots to unveil violence and aggressivity. The contrast is seizing, and will be as impressive on Dein Erwachen, an airy track composed of dissonant harmonics and mystical choirs. The song is quite accessible and goes back to this catchy melting’s basis, then ends with Epilog: Tiefe Narben, an ambient and oppressive final on which some whispers reach us from an impenetrable fog.
Minas Morgul offers a return to the sources, between Old School Black Metal and catchy Folk. The german speakers will immediately understand the meaning of Heimkehr, while the others will progressively learn it.
85/100