But this is supposed to be about Deinonychus, who were already playing a special role in the second wave of black metal, which was just exploding, as the majority of the acts at that time were increasingly oriented towards Norwegian black metal and were traveling in much faster realms or, under the impression of the success of Cradle of Filth's debut album "The principle of evil made flesh", began to move into more moderate soundscapes, whereby the peak of the sometimes unspeakably Gothic bombast "black metal" would not be reached until a few years later. Okay, I've digressed again, but a music-historical classification certainly can't hurt at this point, especially when it comes to the younger generation. Deinonychus (that was and is the brainchild of Marco Kehren, who was also once the singer for the German dark metallers Bethlehem and in this position responsible for the vocals on the S.U.I.Z.I.D. album, among other things) who were already leaving the ordinary musical track back then, celebrated an absolutely outstanding mixture of doom and black metal on their debut, with the occasional black metal raging parts not missing; the driving mid-tempo parts are particularly strong. The absolutely fitting cover artwork and album title set the mood for the hour that follows, perfectly creating a desperate, nightmarish atmosphere from which there seems to be no escape. The rough, sawing guitar creates a washed-out wall of sound that further emphasizes this, while sacred keyboard sounds are used both in the intro and to accentuate the ominous pieces of music.The vocals of mastermind Marco Kehren, here still under the pseudonym "Odin" on the road, range from throaty, dark singing to higher, desperate shrieks and haunting whispers. In one or two passages, the all-consuming darkness recedes and gives way to a spark of hope, especially at the beginning of "Under the autumn tree", in which Kehren narrates the lyrics to calm, undistorted guitar sounds and keyboards. It remains to be mentioned that this masterpiece, which consists of eight mostly overlong tracks (plus intro and outro), was released on the long-gone legendary British label "Cacophonus Records", best known for the release of sucg bads as Cradle of Filth, Sigh, Gehenna or Bal-Sagoth.
