Wrath of Belial
Bloodstained Rebellion

Danes with a healthy dose of wrath are entering the metal scene with their independently released debut album Bloodstained Rebellion. An album with an amusing cover artwork and a logo that looks a bit standardised for the death/thrash metal styled music. And they are described as melodic death/thrash metal with frantic riffs, grandiose melodic passages and neckbreaking grooves, and for once we actually get a rather accurate description in the press info. Add to that vocals that sound like something carrying quite a bit of wrath and you have a pretty decent idea of what to expect from this Danish quintet.

I like their sound; they have plenty of energy, good tempo and some great powerful melodies. However, I don’t like the vocals as they are quite boring and quite standardised death metallic, no real soul and they are mixed in a way that they often drown in the soundscape, and you never really can make out the words which is another thing that I dislike about it. Besides dreary vocals I think they press the right buttons for me and I doubt fans of melodic death will think otherwise, they might even agree with the vocal style.

The variation is decent as well, kind of what you can expect from an album in this genre. In fact that is the other weakness of this album, the lack of originality, it does not sound particularly fresh. They travel down well-travelled paths but with fresh power and plenty of energy, and that makes them worth listening to. In fact, I think that Bloodstained Rebellion is a good album despite the dull vocal performance. It has everything that makes melodic death metal good, it has some great songs as well and when the vocals blend together with the rest of the soundscape you don’t even think about how poor they sound. So I would say that despite some shortcomings, it is a rather enjoyable album to listen to.

Bloodstained Rebellion is a solid, a strong debut album and a good first step on their musical journey. It is a fine album and with that as a starting point I would say that there is a great potential for an exciting evolvement, which means that I would not be surprised if Wrath of Belial becomes a name to be reckoned with some years from now.

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