The Fiery Winds of Armageddon

How many things someone could understand for an album and furthermore for a band just by the artwork. The cover, the photos, the colors which have been used, can give us information even for the musical direction of an album. I don’t say that this is always true, but surely that applies to the new album of Serpentine Creation. The four member band exists since 2001 while since 2004 they are called Serpentine Creation, they came from Bulgaria and they have released one split, one EP and two full length albums. “The Fiery Winds of Armageddon” is their second album which was released in April of 2015 and it contains ten compositions of about forty minutes. As I mentioned before, the artwork of the album can give us a lot of information about what we are going to come across regarding the music of the album. By the cover we can understand that the band deals with Satanism with a more destructive aspect. The chaos, the fire and destruction are the ruling elements. Now musically we can assume that they play a more chaotic, maybe with a more mainstream – professional approach, Black Metal.

By the first track you can understand that the previous assumptions were correct. Serpentine Creation play a heavy, other times fast and chaotic, other times of medium speed and dark Black Metal, which reminds of the Black Metal sound that was the most popular during the second half of the ‘90ies. Indeed, the approach of the band is more professional but without missing out the originality or the spontaneity when needed. So here we will mainly come across medium speed, rhythmic riffing, too dark, full of sentiments and atmosphere. There are also a lot of chaotic – fast outbursts while the compositions don’t lack of beautiful, slow passages. Regarding the compositions, the band has achieved to write very interesting riffs, either those are heavy, melodic with Heavy Metal influences riffs, either they are their faster, heavy but chaotic and destructive ones. Maybe into some parts they will remind you of Dimmu Borgir, but without copying them or reminding them in an annoying level. The tracks have the length that they need in order to evolve completely. The structure of the compositions is quite good and it is not tedious for the listener.

The band is showing that it is consisted of very good musicians as the performance of the instruments is flawless. The guitars with their heavy and warm sound are those which rule the compositions and they achieve to create the atmosphere, the feelings and the images that the band is trying to offer to the listener through its music. The bass is intense and it is audible throughout the entire album, while its lines are interesting. The drums into some parts are quite impressing with their beautiful turnings, violent or massive blastbits and their flawless performance. But into other parts are typical, minimalistic and maybe somehow boring. However, both for the drums the job that has been done is quite good. The vocals are that kind of vocals that I don’t like to listen to. They are heavy, between Black and Death but they are absolutely flat, with no ability to express the different feelings and they will remind you of a lot of other bands. The production puts out a warm and heavy sound but quite dark and threatening. The mixture is very good because it has achieved to add that massive character of the compositions to the sound, but without losing that individual existence of each instrument. Finally, the lyrics are written in English and they describe the destruction after Armageddon and the revenge of demons to god and angels.

In general, the album is quite good. The band has created music so that to address to all the fans of extreme Metal. Surely those of you who are searching for a pure Black Metal release, maybe you should prefer something different. The fans of a more mainstream sound which reminds of Dimmu Borgir, you will surely appreciate this effort.