From Greece, comes Black Metal quintet THYRATHEN, and their sophomore full-length, titled “Lakonic.” The album has seven songs. The opening tones are clean, and dark, and there is tension in the air. A big riff follows, but it’s not the typical Black Metal wall of sound that you often hear in the genre. The bad news is, t’s also not very creative. “Religious Agonies” has both firmer tones as well as one that are more depressive in nature. The clean vocals accentuate this feeling, but again, it’s not very energetic or very creative. “Matter, Void, Sperm” is an odd title for an even odder song. As it continues, you feel worse and worse, but at the same time, it just sounds lifeless to me.

“De Rerum Natura” is another slow grind, accentuating the worse parts of life, and dragging them through the mud. You can really hear the anguish in the vocals, but beyond that, it has trouble getting off the ground. “Η Πόλις (the Philosophical Poem)” showcases the band’s ability to create harrowing sounds with clean tones, but this promise is dashed when the harsh vocals come around. It ends up sounding cheesy to me. “Void, Matter, Sperm” is yet another campy song which just fails to excite me, and this album is dragging on. “Scales & Sword (the Fall of Justice)” is yet another slow, depressive song. The anguished clean vocals really bring out the torture.

Unfortunately, despite some differences from many of their Black Metal peers who just slam down the gas for the entire album, much of the album was forgettable to me, and just a bit on the campy side. It wasn’t a bad album per se, it just failed to excite me.