But I do try to open as many emails as I can, and it’s pretty random as to how and why I open any of them and check out the music contained within. Sometimes, it’s my mood, sometimes it’s whatever the tagline email is, and if it’s in the style I’m currently immersed in, etc. But I can’t tell why I opened the email from ‘J’, the vocalist/guitarist from a very obscure (to most, I’m sure) Slovakian black metal act Obšar, while in bed checking the promotional emails, as I often do.

But boy am I glad I did! Even though the email was short and polite, it didn’t tell me anything about the music, just a Bandcamp link, which I, again, for reasons unknown – (fate, destiny, the way of wryd?) opened and listened to.

I’m rarely surprised by any music I get nowadays; very little is truly unique or different anymore, either re-runs, retreads, established genres, and copy cats, which is fine, I like what I like. But this 4-song 22-minute EP is more of the more unique and blissfully delightful pieces of music I’ve heard recently.

Loosely residing in the symphonic/folk black metal realm, the internet tells me these guys were a more traditional folk/symphonic black metal act for three prior albums since 2018. However, on this EP, there appears to have been a bit of a shift.

When I pressed play and “Sucha rokyta” started, I was greeted with a sort of bouncy, catchy, new wave, synth pop black metal. Still harsh and residing in black metal’s atmospheric/melodic realms, especially vocally, but with these 80s sci-fi movie sort of cyber-y synths, rather than epic or sweeping orchestral arrangements. I think if you took Poland’s Furia mixed it with bands like Australia’s Metharsim or Ukraine’s Labyrinthus Stellarum, and even get hints of Covenant’s Nexus Polaris, you might get sort of close to this uniquely fun sound.

Second track “Sľipa vira” is a more mid-paced industrial stomper, cheesy 80s sci-fi, ‘hero walking through the rain in a neon-lit dystopian underground city’ vibes (Blade Runner/Deus Ex games, anyone?). The female ‘ahhhhhhh aahhhhh’ croons, cements the Nexis Polaris vibe too.

My personal favorite is the third track, “Falošnŷj prorok” a wondrously cosmic, airy. galloping track, before the EP ends with a tense, instrumental number that could be a chase scene in the aforementioned sci-fi movie/game.

I know this is a lot of words for a mere 22 minutes of music, but man, am I enamoured with these guys, especially this newer, neon-lit, cyber/sci-fi direction (I have checked out the band’s back catalog).