NEGURĂ BUNGET — Vîrstele Pamîntului (review)

NEGURĂ BUNGET — Vîrstele Pamîntului album cover Album · 2010 · Atmospheric Black Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
4/5 ·
Vehemency
Negură Bunget has always been a fascinating band but for an unknown reason they never hooked me completely, not even on the acclaimed 2006-album Om. I am still eager to hear every time what they have to offer, and now with an almost entirely different line-up they have come up with a new album.

Listening to Vîrstele Pămîntului is a very visual experience inside my head: it evokes pictures of uninhabitated forests and mountainsides, a cold breeze blowing on an autumnal, near-winter evening. But it is nothing usual à la the endless forest black metal bands, it is something different and unique that only Negură Bunget itself can create. Throughout this 60-minute monster, Romanian traditional instruments, acoustic guitars and synths are apparent in every corner, and the amount of non-metal material is almost dominant. The metal parts are played tightly and they are in good balance with the non-distorted sections. Overall mood on the album shifts from mysterious, fog-like atmosphere to more saddened melodies, although most often the music is a mixture of both. Weird, but ingenious.

Negură Bunget succeeds in what it has succeeded on previous albums too: unique melodies and totally own sound, making Vîrstele Pămîntului an interesting record that endures many spins, in fact, it gets even better every time. This is not to be missed by those who are into experimental, atmospheric and folkish black metal. My rating might go up later but I won’t give a better score yet for such a new album. Vîrstele Pămîntului certainly makes me check the previous album Om more closely if I missed something, now that I have more perspective.
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Vehemency wrote:
more than 2 years ago
Yeah, many people consider Om as a total masterpiece while this album is seen as "meh". I heard Om the first time in 2006 when it was released and since then I've given it maybe one or two spins a year, but never focused enough to it. Going to change that soon because I'm in the mood for listening to their whole discography now.
UMUR wrote:
more than 2 years ago
Interesting review. I´ve reviewed this album for Prog Archives. I didn´t like it much compared to their earlier releases. I´ll post my review here when I get the time to make a few edits.

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