If you surveyed an abundance of black metal artists and asked them what their favorite tempo was, a lot of them would no doubt say fast -- very fast -- and they would note that blastbeats are an important part of the black metal experience for them. But not all black metal bands thrive on lightning-speed tempos and inundate their listeners with blastbeats.
Khold, for example, have chosen to inflict much of their brutality at slow and medium tempos, and that approach continues to yield effective results for them on
Hundre Ar Gammal ("A Hundred Years Old"). While this 2008 release is not devoid of fast tempos, they are hardly dominant; in fact, they take a back seat to the disc's medium and slow tempos. But whatever tempo
Khold opts to embrace, this 36-minute CD is consistently inspired, and the Norwegian band gets the job done nicely on forceful Norwegian-language items such as "Mester og Trell" ("Master and Thrall"), "Straff" ("Punishment"), "Der Kulden Rår" ("When the Cold Reigns") and "Troløs" ("Faithless"). Of course, most of the
Khold fans who live outside of Norway don't speak Norwegian, but the good news is that
Khold have a lot of non-Norwegian admirers who don't consider Norwegian lyrics a deal breaker. And why should they be? There is no law stating that black metal has to be performed in English to be worthwhile. Some listeners might complain about
Hundre Ar Gammal's brevity and wish that the album were 30 or 40 minutes longer, but then, 36 minutes of excitement is certainly preferable to 75 minutes of mediocrity.
Hundre Ar Gammal is an excellent addition to
Khold's catalog.
~ Alex Henderson