Thyruz - Svik

THYRUZ - Svik (Self released - CD 2014)

This time I have a pleasure to introduce you to rather little know Norwegian black metal band… and you know, it is always a great thing to listen to some classic black metal bands from this country, which will always be my favourite black metal scene, despite some ups and downs of it. But I must say that I feel a little uncomfortable, reviewing “Svik”. Why? Well, this is already Thyruz’s third album (plus they had an impressive number of five demos recorded!), so it sucks that I only find out about this band, their existence and their music now… which is so damn late. It makes the whole experience a little bit more difficult and obviously any tries to compare “Svik” to the previous releases are impossible. I’m simply not able to say whether the band has progressed or changes at all during all these years. But from the other hand it gives me a fresh perspective, an open mind and more importantly it has a feeling of surprise, which is also priceless.

I must say that right from the beginning I liked Thyruz. First there’s a nice intro “Prodita”, which sets a great war mood and then “Dødsriket” kicks off… and damn, this is just a classic Norsk black metal! If you think of such bands as 1349, Mayhem, Urgehal, Koldbrann, Svarttjern, Endstille (which is not Norwegian, but deeply influenced by this scene!) and in some riffs there’s even a sign of the great craft of Thorns, then you’ll know what Thyruz is all about. Quite harsh, uncompromising, utterly cold, emotionless, inhuman, furious and merciless stuff! Great, throat-cutting, sharp riffs, a lot of fast and vicious, cruel parts… and you know, I do realize that “Svik” is not the most impressive and brilliant black metal of all time, but it is good and solid enough for me and more so, I think that the fans of the bands, which I mentioned above will worship this music totally. Personally I like this bleak, austere, cold atmosphere of their music, this feeling which it has… and most importantly, there are several absolutely fantastic riffs / fragments spread over the album, which makes it just special and totally worthy. Like that opening motif for “Dødsriket”… I like how this song progresses into some total neckbreaking ferocity – it is just madness, but so fuckin awesome! It definitely is my favourite song from the album. But there are more killer anthems; “The Final Holocaust”, “Svik” (which is a great, more monumental, but still very misanthropic and cold song)… in total the CD offers 30 minutes of black metal madness. The album is released on thin digipack, more so, it is a self released effort of the band, so I can only recommend it now to all maniacs! Support to Thyruz!

Standout tracks: “Dødsriket”, “The Final Holocaust”

Final rate: 70/100