SARKE: A new band featuring Sarke in drums, guitars & bass - who is also known as member of bands like TULUS or KHOLD - and has written all the material for this project. Also here we have Nocturno Culto in the vocals. For this reason and only the curiosity to hear Vorunah is big 'cause the 'outside DARKTHRONE' participations of Ted Skjellum are rare. I can recall the SATYRICON things plus the guest appearance in VIDSYN only. So, you can realize that this CD is of major importance for any DARKTHRONE maniac.
I cannot say that I had any special expectations for Vorunah. Neither Sarke's bands are among my favourites, but this album melted my brains from the first time I heard it. Since we have something with much variety and most of the tracks are different between them I cannot avoid a track-by-track approach for some better description.
Primitive Killing comes straight from a Thrash Metal substratum. It has very good riffs, a bridge 'almost Doom' and the end of the song is excellent for headbanging. Here you can find the album's only solo. This is probably the best song that grabs you from the start and is also a 'must listen'.
The self-titled cut moves in almost the same paths except from the frozen key-based refrain. I feel it will be not an illogical conclusion writing that deep inside a gray melancholy is hiding, that transforms or makes it travelling in a parallel cosmos of crust things like AMEBIX and AXEGRINDER. I must underline that I'm not talking about influences but same vibes. Drunken Priest is a pleasant late SATYRICON copy; good but a copy. A more icy mountain character of the album is present with Frost Junkie (!!!). Slow, doomy...The same goes for 13 Candles and Cult Ritual that, except some piano melodies, have a lot of CANDLEMASS influences. Old is not so good and the full Black Metal Dead Universe seems apathetic, not bad but without anything special inside.
The sound has a 70s feel, like it was recorded in a warm wooden hut in the mountains. Nocturno Culto's voice - without being something bombastic - carries a bearishness, an aura of north winds that wallop the dark forests. The album gains bonus for this reason. A musical description of isolated landscapes that surely the eyes of two persons here often see.
SARKE have already performed two live appearances in Norway and they have announced a Wacken one this summer. Of course it seems difficult for me to imagine how a live version of tracks like Frost Junkie or 13 Candles could be, but - on the other hand - Primitive Killing fits perfect. It is a very nice work that can be used for some mountain tripping, especially in winter time.