Right that’s it, enough doom, gloom, death and destruction. I want something fun and jolly to listen to and review for a change. Perfect timing as the new album by German nutty melodic metal clan Equilibrium has recently landed in my inbox and they are a well-known tonic for the blues and have cheered me up no end over their past three albums as well as playing a mental show the one time I was lucky enough to see them on their only UK jaunt to date.
It looks as if the group are now listed as just a trio, things changed a fair bit after 2010 album Rekreatur and seemingly a couple of others such as long time bass player Sandra van Eldik have departed after completion of this. Still it does not seem to have dampened the spirits of surviving original player and composer René Berthiaume too much as far as Erdentempel is concerned and the band that I have described in the past of playing around the world in 1000 riffs have not slowed down in the slightest and take us on another giddy journey here.
After pompous intro its off on a whiplash inducing mad stomp as ‘Was lange währt’ breezes in with a battle metal clamour at such a frantic speed that playing it near Turisas would just leave them laying down their arms and giving up any thought of fight. It’s heavy on the melody and the guttural growls of Robse, their most recent vocalist fit in along with some clean chanting parts. Naturally there are the Gaelic sounding Celtic parts here that the German bands love so much and if you want to dance it will be a case of looking for a river to cool off your feet of flames. Birds chirp, a cock crows and the infectious folk laden barn dance of a number Waldschrein literally drops us in the Forest Shrine. The little people jig around the campfire and it does have that blockbuster ‘Disney laden’ vibe about the composition and you kind of expect a bunch of marauding pirates to be raiding as a parrot squawks and the vocals steam in. It’s a wild old hurdy-gurdy of a number and a no doubt right dervish live that will have everyone skidding about on the wet dance-floor as beer flies in all directions. You very much get the feeling that this is “music for heroes” and not zeroes, it’s up front in your face, cocky and above all jubilant.
This is pretty much the feel throughout too, there is nothing miserable about the album in the slightest and it really does leave you with a shit eating grin as it takes you around the globe like you have embarked on some sort of massive adventure in search of buried treasure and lost civilisations. If you find any you will be invited to party with them rather than eaten or anything more sinister too. With pipes a trilling, the jig of Uns’rer Flöten Klang definitely pitches you on the Emerald Isle and there’s even a splash of mad neo-classical sounding tooting going on here. ‘Heavy Chill’ sounds like a march over icy peaks before dropping down into a jungle, are we in the ‘Land That Time Forgot’ and where’s Doug McClure when you need him? Probably battling trolls on another album. The albums mentalist break though is Wirtshaus Gaudi when a village inn is invaded and it sounds like a mash up of twanging Western themes and mental hummpa music as the brass band lead the chant and no doubt someone burns the bratwurst! I guess we are all a bit upside down with Apokalypse as it sounds like a bit of didgeridoo here before the number goes not so much walkabout but stompabout and gives out some serious neck wrecking riffs along with some tribal drum beats. Naturally all great adventures have to come to an end and this does so with the curious sounding ‘The Unknown Episode’ which has a massive sounding chorus bringing it all to a swaggering conclusion.
You certainly leave this one feeling like you got it all, bells, whistles, big screen effects and a great rush of a ride. Hopefully this is a tale with many more parts to come in the future and it would be great if it swung into London town and rolled out the barrel for us live here. Right that’s enough of this bloody cheerfulness, back to the dark for me.
(8/10 Pete Woods)
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