Curse Upon a Prayer : "the Three Woes"

People will never be satisfied, so there is no point in pleasing them and that should not be metal's goal to be safe. When the debate rises about satanic metal someone always says "You guys don't have the balls to pick on Islam". Then when it happens, people shit their pants and say it's racist. Nothing should be sacred. Why is it o.k to attack one religion and not another? This band from Finland has the balls to not give a fuck and this album lashes out at Islam. Now there is a political slant since aside from the hippies in Sweden, the rest of Scandinavia tries to be fairly isolationist.  Americans are quick to call this racist, because in their intolerance of intolerance  it never dawns on them at other countries have other ways of doing things. In fact who every said America's way was that great to begin in the first place as it doesn't seem to working that great for them at present. But enough of the politics, at the end of the day it boils down to what are these guys doing different that I have not heard other black metal bands do a hundred times?

The first song tell me not a lot aside from being really aggressive and hateful in their sound which certainly helps to get their message across. Thundering double bass, blast beats and tremolo picked guitar all do their part to make this black metal as fuck.Their are hints of melody in the guitar. They passion with which they throw themselves into their music compensates for anytime they might not be the most original band on the planet. "Thou Shalt Be Cursed" opens with a little more atmosphere but races off. The vocals are at a mid range snarl. There is a lower more death metal vocals that joins in. The melodic touches that come in by the two minute mark help give the dynamics needed to keep things from becoming one blur.

The croak almost moves into more of a sung tone for a few words on "Woe ! Woe ! Woe!" . There is more of an icy ambient coating the rapid thrashing. This makes this song darker. I appreciate the mood and melodic touches. The vocals modulating through a range or croaks and snarls. I think lyrically since I have more of a resentment against Christianity the lyric would resonate with more if they were railing against Christ even though he is such an easy target.Not wildly original these guys have put every ounce of their hateful hearts into this and it paid off I'll give it a 9 and look forward to hearing the full length. Congrats to Saturnal Records for having the balls to put this out.
2.7