Anima Damnata – Agonizing Journey Through The Burning…
My only previous exposure to this band came from a split release they shared with Throneum. I was not terribly impressed with Anima Damnata on that release, but I had bought it for the Throneum tracks and was already agitated that I had to sit through the one to get to the other. Now on to the newest release of Anima Damnata, fully titled “Agonizing Journey Through The Burning Universe And Transcendental Ritual Of Transfiguration” fully titled indeed. Stylistically, this is somewhere between the realms of war metal, and death grind. The vast majority of the material is played fast, leaving much of it to blend together. In fact, I think they even bleed all the tracks into one another here so that there is not a moment of silence on the entire disc. If you are going to do something like that, you had better have more distinguishable and memorable songs than this. When they do slow down, the songs take on a bit more identity, but with pseudonyms like “Nocturnal harvester of Christian lambs and the great messenger of subliminal satanic messages” I doubt they aim to do much aside from blast in blinded blasphemy for the majority of their career. There is some cool old school packaging on this release that kind of reminds me of the artwork of Chris Moyen, only not quite as good. If you like bands like Black Witchery and don’t mind more of a death metal vibe, check these guys out. – Lance Rogers
PAGAN
