ARGHOSLENT — Galloping Through the Battle Ruins (review)

ARGHOSLENT — Galloping Through the Battle Ruins album cover

Album · 1998 · Death Metal

3/5 · 2010-11-03
UMUR

"Galloping Through the Battle Ruins" is the debut full-length studio album by melodic US death metal act Arghoslent (melodic not melodeath). The album was released through Wood Nymph Records in October 1998. The origial CD pressing was limited to 1000 copies and as a curiosity some copies came with rat bones inside the CD jewel case. "Galloping Through the Battle Ruins" has since been re-released on both vinyl, Cassette Tape and CD through various labels.

The music on the album is pretty old school sounding death metal with lots of melodic and memorable hooks. I remember the first time I played Arghoslent for my older brother and he was positive that they were a Swedish act. That would have been my first guess too, but they are in fact an American act. Lots of harmony work by the guitars means that the album is pretty accessible even though the music is actually rather brutal. Mostly as a result of the vocals being growling and brutal but the music and the delivery of the music are also pretty raw. The tracks feature several shift in pace and they are not strictly vers/chorus based, which make them a bit more challenging to listen to than other artists using the more formulaic vers/chorus songwriting approach.

The sound production is a bit sub-par to the otherwise good quality music, but it´s not that much of a distraction really. In other words! It could have been much worse, and the raw sound do suit the equally raw music. "Galloping Through the Battle Ruins" is a decent first release by Arghoslent and while they would go on to produce better releases later on in their career this one is still recommendable to fans of the band and fans of melodic death metal. A 3 star (60%) rating is warranted.

more than 2 years ago
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Vehemency wrote:

more than 2 years ago

It was a Finnish only "tour", January 2009. There also played Gravewürm, Satanic Warmaster and Drowning the Light. One date in Helsinki, and one date in the outskirts of Tampere. Here's a few individuals that manage to organize this kind of rare events, it's great.

UMUR wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Oh and Hornets of the Pogrom is quite a fantastic album. I´m looking forward to reviewing that one.

UMUR wrote:

more than 2 years ago

My brother is a giant fan. I´m not much of a lyrics guy and I generally don´t judge a band by their political beliefs ( I don´t have to agree with them to enjoy the music), so I´m able to appreciate the album. I would have liked to see them live. When did they visit Scandinavia? As usual they probably skipped Denmark though. My brother would be devastated if they had played in Denmark and we didn´t attend the concert.

Vehemency wrote:

more than 2 years ago

Not a big fan of this album, but "Hornets of the Pogrom" is amazing. Saw the band live some time ago, and due to ideological connections, it had to be held in a private location. Rented busses took us there. A nice change to common bar gigs, heh.