Primordial - Imrama (Reissue)
Rating
RIYL
AgallochNegură Bunget
Enslaved
Release Date
03/31/2009
Label
Metal BladeTracklist
1. Fuil Ársa2. Infernal Summer
3. Here I Am King
4. The Darkest Flame
5. The Fires…
6. Mealltach
7. Let the Sun Set on Life Forever
8. To the Ends of the Earth
9. Beneath a Bronze Sky
10. Awaiting the Dawn
11. To Enter Pagan (demo)
12. The Darkest Flame (demo)
13. Among the Lazarae (demo)
14. To the Ends of the Earth (demo)
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Ireland’s Primordial has the honor of being one of the very first black metal bands to incorporate the folk melodies of their homeland into the fabric of their music. Their blend of Celtic beauty and black metal savagery was ahead of its time and as such it took nearly 18 years after their inception to gain international attention. 2005 saw the release of The Gathering Wilderness; a very distinctive and focused album that built on their pagan metal roots while also branching into modernity through extensive use of English lyrics and high quality production values. To The Nameless Dead was a fine, if redundant, follow up and music fans the world over were aware of the mighty Primordial. Unfortunately, the release of Imrama in April ‘09 will most likely slow down the band’s formerly formidable momentum.
It must be stressed that Imrama is not a new release. It is simply a reissue of their 1995 full length of the same name, with a few audio tweaks and the addition of a rare demo from a further 2 years previous. This re-release contains no new material, although there is a separate dual disc version that contains live footage of several songs from the album. I cannot attest to the quality of these videos, however. Nonetheless, from past experience with Metal Blade live albums, it would be safe to assume that the sound is of an acceptable caliber.
The music on the actual record is very typical of bands in the folk/black metal realm. Acoustic guitars and Gaelic chanting are just as commonplace as raspy screams and blastbeats. All of this is accomplished adequately enough, but there is a certain ‘je ne sais quoi’ that is missing. None of the songs stand out from the others. Occasionally you’ll hear a melody that sounds truly inspired, and when combined with Naihmass Nemtheanga’s powerful and nuanced voice, the results are worth hearing. The desperate and malevolent verse/chorus interplay of “Infernal Summer” and the apocalyptic beginning of “The Darkest Flame” highlight this impressive combination. Maddeningly, Primordial fails to capitalize on these moments, and most of the ground gained is lost by the end of the song.
I’m most frustrated by the reissue itself. As far as I know, there was no public demand for this album to be re-released. Plenty of other classic and underappreciated albums (Lykathea Aflame’s Elvenefris and Cryptopsy’s Blasphemy Made Flesh immediately come to mind) are much more deserving of enhanced production values and a wide, advertised release. The lack of new songs on the reissue is also disappointing. It’s been nearly two years since Primordial last released an album, and a collection of old, middling songs is a poor substitute for fresh tunes. I fear more harm than good will come of Imrama v. 2.0. The Primordial that penned those songs doesn’t exist anymore. Regrettably, many novice listeners will hear and, most likely, write-off one of the better modern metal acts due to the poorly chosen and timed release of their earliest and least representative full-length.
Perhaps I’m too familiar with the Irish band’s later work, but I can’t help but compare Imrama to the remainder of their discography. It is by far the weakest link in Primordial’s sound, but that is to be expected. The genre was very young at the time of Imrama’s arrival and the stylistic boundaries were still being drawn. Experimentation will rarely yield a winning formula at first and so a certain amount of leeway should be granted for the fallible nature of man. This fact excuses a single release of the record. Mistakes were made and those early deficiencies have been stamped out through perseverance and sonic evolution. A re-release of the album, however, is a different beast altogether. Imrama preserves the aural legacy of trial and error for legions of potential fans that assume that the most recent release contains the freshest songs.
The inclusion of new, albeit plain, cover art, the onerously run-of-the-mill Dark Romanticism... Sorrow's Bitter Harvest demo, and a production re-mastering that is barely distinguishable from the original recording are hardly compelling reasons to run out and purchase the Imrama reissue. Although diehard fans will no doubt relish the live footage and sudden availability of a formerly difficult to find album, the more discerning and thrifty music lover would do well to skip the history lesson. Instead, purchase The Gathering Wilderness and delve straight into the near perfect result of over a decade’s worth of songcraft experience.
--Ian Woods
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