Nów - Nowia (2007/2012)

Cassette version.

Some months ago I was sent a bunch of tapes by Trivialis, these being cassette editions released and in some cases re-released by the underground label Werewolf Promotion (not to be mixed with SW's Werewolf Records!) of his various musical projects. Among them was today's item, the debut album of Nów, released originally on CD by the Polish label Eastside in 2004.

I have no personal experience with the CD version myself so I'm unable to compare this limited (320 copies) tape edition with it. The contents are same, 12 songs for almost an hour of pagan metal and no remastering, -mixing or anything of the sort has been performed. Originally recorded in Eden studio over the period of a year due to various personal problems, the recording does not sound dated today though I am not exactly an expert on folk-influenced melodic metal. The band themselves describe themselves as Slavonic pagan metal, a hybrid of black and heavy metal with a touch of folk. That description is mostly correct, though I'd say there's very little black metal left here. Some harsh vocals are used but the main voice is clean male singing, supported occasionally by female voice. Both are doing a decent job from what I can tell. Most of the riffing and melodies also lean heavier to heavy and folk metal direction rather than anything sinister, which is probably quite suitable keeping the concept in mind. The clean and balanced production serves the music well, allowing the guitar to still be the dominant instrument while leaving room for the drums, vocals, synths and flute to be audible without conflicts. I can't tell if Trivialis actually included a bass on the recording, at least I can't hear it. All the lyrics are written in Polish, so there is little I can say about them, my skill with the language being limited to "kurwa" and some other useful phrases. Glory of Fatherland and the Slavonic gods would be the main focus from what I can tell.

Eastside flyer for CD.

If we move to the obligatory name-dropping, first ones to come to mind are Falkenbach, some of the viking Bathory material, maybe Cruachan but not as folky and naturally without the Celtic stuff, even later Amorphis and then I draw a blank trying to come up with others. This is more upbeat and leans so much more towards traditional metal spectrum rather than extreme that I find myself a bit at loss as I don't really listen to this sort of pagan/folk metal. Pagan black metal yes, but that's quite different.

This is a very neat cassette release, the music is performed well and with dedication, the sound is clear and powerful, it is melodic and Slavonic but in the end of the day not my glass of vodka. There's no darkness in this, at all, hardly any melancholy or much aggression either and it is just too clean to satisfy my heavy metal tastes. I think it would probably work better if it was a little shorter, around 40 to 45 minutes perhaps.

However for fans of melodic pagan/folk metal it is definitely worth checking out, the artists are practising what they preach and very dedicated. You could check if Trivialis still has some copies of this tape left, he was selling them for very cheap. Or try the label, they have a huge selection and send all over the globe.