Friday, July 28, 2017

REBEL SOULS - The Forces of Darkness review



REBEL SOULS - The Forces of Darkness

Art Gates Records





You've gotta listen to things a few times before making a judgement call. Case in point, so the first time I listened to this German band's debut full length I wasn't automatically enthused enough so I started doing household chores while it played in the background. After a while I was in the other room when I thought hey this is pretty cool. 

REBEL SOULS hail from Germany but I think they live in Spain now. The band is a two piece act with bassist/vocalist Stefan Hielscher and guitarist Thomas Plewnia. They enlist a session drummer, James Stewart, as well. The band started out back in 2000, yeah I know, holy shit. But they did put out some demos and a single along the way. Both members were/are also in DEAD ENTITIES' REALM so that explains the gap.

Musically what we have here is plenty of straight up death metal via the 90's era Euro style. At times you've got punishing riffs with searing leads and brute force vocals. Other times things get slightly melodic but not to the point of Swedish wimp. These two guys know how to keep things brutal and relentless albeit in a past era which nowadays there's so many others in the driver's seat. Think Poland for example since the French are going totally blackened death.  Good? Yeah but there's so much else to choose from in this death metal pond.


http://www.artgatesrecords.com/

https://rebelsouls.bandcamp.com/releases

https://www.facebook.com/rebelsouls.deathmetal/

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