Man, back in the late 90s and early 00s Germany’s Folk/Celtic-themed melo-death act Suidakra was one my absolute favorite bands. Early albums Auld Lang Syne and Lays From Afar were my jam. And even with some ups (Caledonia, Book of Dowth, The Arcanum) and downs (Command to Charge, Realms of Odoric, Cimbric Yarns), some of their tunes over their 14 album discography remain some of my favorites in the genre (“The 9th Legion”, “Morrigan”, “The Fall of Tara”, “Gilded Oars”, “War Pipes Call Me”, “Highland Hills”, “Wartunes”). I even saw them in 2009 opening for Alestorm and Tyr.
Now, I can’t speak too much about some of the band’s more recent efforts like 2021s Wolfbite or 2019s Echoes of Yore as I gave up on the band after the acoustic/folk music-only effort Cimbric Yarns, but when we got the promo for their latest effort, I thought I’d give them another shake and see how one of my old flames has fared since we broke up.
Well, it appears they are doing swimmingly as after a brief intro, Darkanakrad comes screaming out of the gate with “As Heroes Abide”, a fucking attention-throttling, album-opening number for the ages, signaling that indeed Suidakra are still going strong. And the album does not let go from there.
The guitar tone is to die for with a modern Hypocrisy-ish crunch (it’s come a long way since Lupine Essence), and just enough folky/Celtic vibes to make it still Suidakra. “Unraveling Destinies”, continues the strong start with a more mid-paced crunch, that allows the excellent production to breathe and we some of those Celtic clean vocals.
“Seven Sentinels” is an epic 6-minute tune that has a little of everything that Suidakra has delivered over the years, while “A Tainted Dominion” is a more urgent, fierce number, where again I keep coming back to the killer guitar tone ( which founder and frontman Arkadius is responsible for).
“Ashes of Truth” delivers one of the band’s trademark acoustic/folk numbers that they have delivered since the debut before the trio of “Heart of Darkness”, “The Last Guardian” and “Cruinnath’s Breath” deliver sturdy, crunchy melodeath, but nothing as great as the opening act.
That all said, this album lacks some of the consistent truly Celtic moments, as only “The Last Guardian” and instrumental “In Shadows Deep” have bagpipes, which made some of the early albums so good. It appears they are pretty much more straight-up modern melodic death metal with a few Celtic-ish riffs and song titles (i.e. “Cruinnaths’s Breath”). A fact sort of cemented by the final track “At The Gates Medly” (that seems to be the band’s first three albums only). But it’s still pretty good, and certainly one of the ‘ups’ of the band’s considerable discography.
Still, I guess I need to check out Wolfbite and Echoes of Yore now.
