I surrender and deliver my soul to Tardigrada. They create music that pierces my body, reap my soul and elevates it to the heavens, to the side of the Norse gods. Tardigrada are a atmospheric black metal band from Switzerland and holds in its current line-up Kryptos (vocals, guitars and lyrics), Threnos (guitars) and H.A.T.T. (drums). The band presents us “Widrstand“, their debut demo, and i must confess that this is one of the best black metal Demos i’ve had the pleasure to hear this year.
Tardigrada’s music is absolutely amazing. That embedded rawness on “Widrstand” sound really takes me to those frigid and austere landscapes of northern Europe, where each note wail pierces my skin like the whistling wind in the coldest of winters. Tardigrada’s sound is full of genuine and raw emotions that inspire sadness, shapes it, with those thin, sharp and cold riffs, and spits it out through an incorporeal storm of raw energy through Kryptos desperate screams.
“Widrstand” opens with “Uftakt” a beautiful, deep and dreamy atmospheric instrumental intro that sounds very ethereal and pure, but all of that brightness is totally overshadowed by “Hoffnungslos“, one of the most amazing tracks of the Demo, i mean, this track absolutely swipes me away. Its atmosphere is painted in shades of grey and charged with a heavy melancholic sadness but at the same time it holds an almost poetic side to it, connected between them like two opposite energy poles. It’s this attraction to sadness and depression that draws us closer and closer to the edge, as we fall deeper and deeper under the spell of Tardigrada. The title track “Widrstand” follows it’s ancestor and continues that ravishing storm of negative energy, as Kryptos screams tear through the icy thin wall of the guitars and the drums unloads all of its fury upon us.
The end arrives at the sound of “Einsamkeit“, the epitome, the compendium, the end. Only tears. No life. No salvation. No ascension. Just loneliness. Tardigrada’s music seems simple but the way they craft it is absolutely beautiful and filled with emotion. It has a very characteristic personality, that conjugated with that rawness gives the band a very unique and outstanding sound giving the tracks a very epic touch. A band of this kind, with a sound like this is definitely something that is not easy to find nowadays. A true gem in the middle of this dreary and vast ocean of black metal music.
Stream the full Demo right after the jump, support the band by buying the Demo tape at Fallen Empire Records store. The Demo comes with full sized poster of the exclusive album art which was hand drawn by Wolfgang Beelzebub. Only analog is real.
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