Since the 1990s the old banners of ancestral glory have been raised to the highest point on the hill. However, even desired by many, few managed to harvest their Edelweiss from the sacred soil, the one that keeps the secrets long forgotten by the people, soil which was baptized by the blood shed over the millennia and which 1945 had its last great baptism.
Few are worthy of carrying these banners, few are those who know how to listen to these secrets and transmit them from their spirit to the outside. Few can call themselves werewolves. Athalwolf is one of those who have these attributes.
Since 1998, Athalwolf has been transmitting the purest of his belief in superiority. With its roots in Greece, Athalwolf understood that as Heidegger defended, superiority is not just a physical attribute but a spiritual attribute and quality. And over the last 24 years he has offered through music the best of his attribute.
The year 2022 was a year of great work for Wolfnacht participating in a split with Goatmoon and Thy Serpent and releasing two simultaneous albums, Soldatenlieder and Blutgebuden. This review is about this second title. (The detailed review of the magnificent “Soldatenlieder” will be in the next issue of Black Metal Terror magazine).
Unlike “Eine Flamme im Dunkeln”, a 2020 album, in which it presented a sound closer to the traditional Greek black metal with a clearer and more audible production, Blutgebuden brings a more complex sound, with a not so clear production (mainly in the first two songs) which may at first cause some difficulty for the listener but which is soon overcome because what emanates from each song is something of its own, not so obvious.
“Feuer und Stahl” starts demanding that everyone march, with a faster dynamic that decreases throughout the song ending in a box marking the soldiers’ march; “Eine Volk, Eine Reich, Eine Fuhrer” has a dynamic very similar to the previous song. “Der Grimmig Tod”, an old German song whose composition dates back to the Renaissance, has its lugubrious version with a slightly slower musicality compared to previous songs, more complex drum tempos and guitar riffs marking each stanza. “Eine König unter der Eiche” is a classic Wolfnacht song with RAC tempos interspersed with guitar riffs in more traditional heavy metal grooves, with melodies presenting an epic, almost apocalyptic background.
“Der verwundete Wanderer” maintains the same dirty rac/heavy metal atmosphere (something traditional in Greek black metal), as if it wanted to convey to the listener a sadness in the chosen melodies (something that whoever purchases the cd can understand from the cover broadcast on the background colors gray).
“Waldesnacht” is a song that transcends. I had previously heard it on YouTube and in my opinion it is the best song on this album. It’s a song that resembles a war march sung on the battlefronts and its ending should be translated by everyone who doesn’t know German because the message is strong and perpetual and serves as a summary of this record and that can be described as don’t let the world take away your will to sing what represents you and what feeds your blood and your spirit.
“Dann bleiben, was dir Schlimmes auch geschieht,
Stets rein gestimmt die Saiten deiner Brust,
Und auch nach trüben Zeiten wird dein Lied
Nicht ärmer sein an froher Sängerlust.”
“Die Wächter Europas” places, in the same way as mentioned above, a tragic, epic feeling in each melody expressed (with a similar musical structure to the tracks “Eine König unter der Eiche” and “Der verwundete Wanderer”). It’s as if this song demands that each of us take our individual journey towards our tombstone carved in this sacred ground, which must be honored with this blood and a daily spiritual battle, keep the front up because we will not be alone. A great ending to this great record.
Thus, Blutgebuden, through its complexity, is an epic, tragic, dramatic record, it is as if the Supreme Leader himself, since Shambhala was returning to govern the end of time and calling for Ragnarok, which began many years ago. The end of this song makes that clear. Only the blind and foolish haven’t realized it yet.
Athalwolf already noticed this feeling and turned it into music.
Mandatory and only for the strong.
Review written by Wotan’s Raven