Rating:
Genre:
Rock
Release Date: 08/22/2006
In any genre of music -- whether
rock,
jazz,
R&B,
blues,
gospel,
reggae,
new age,
salsa, or
hip-hop -- there are bound to be leaders (those who are innovative) and followers (those who aren't innovative). The contributions of the followers, who inevitably outnumber the leaders, shouldn't be dismissed or underappreciated; there is no law stating that derivative art cannot be good art or even great art. That said, it is always exciting to hear something really fresh-sounding, and the term fresh-sounding certainly describes what
SpiRitual does on
Pulse.
SpiRitual is a side project for
Stefan Hertrich, lead singer for the German
goth metal band
Darkseed -- and the vocalist has come up with an unlikely mixture of
metal,
world music, and
ambient music. Of course, the term
world music is very far-reaching; in
SpiRitual's case, it generally means Indian, Middle Eastern, and North African elements.
Hertrich takes those elements and successfully combines them with elements of
gothic metal,
death metal/black metal, and
alternative metal. There are ethereal female vocals on
Pulse (from Russian singer
Yana Veva), and there are both extreme male vocals (usually, a
black metal-style rasp) and clean male vocals. Forceful, downtuned
metal guitars are part of
Hertrich's game plan, but so are
ethnic flutes and
ethnic percussion. And much to his credit,
Hertrich manages to pull all of these things together in a coherent, logical fashion.
Hertrich is hardly the only person in
metal who is going for that heaven/hell contrast; a long list of
symphonic black metal and melodic
death metal bands have been contrasting the melodic and the extreme. Nor is he the only headbanger who is interested in
world music. But the way that he integrates the
metal,
world, and
ambient elements on this album is definitely out of the ordinary.
Pulse is among the most memorable and risk-taking
metal releases of 2006.
~Alex Henderson, All Music Guide
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