Review Summary: The hills are alive with the sound of the Celtic.
Bran Barr is a Celtic Black metal band (self-proclaimed as "Celtic war metal") hailing from Paris, France. Despite having only two full LP's they are a relatively old band, formed just over 20 years ago. This is their second release, and despite it only being their sophomore album, it seems as if the band has carved an amazing vision for their sound. They have already done a splendid job in creating a verdant yet bloodstained picture of a rather bleak yet epic Gallic war. This begins off the first track in the opening thirty seconds, with a thunderous tribal drum introduction. When listening to it, you can almost see a campfires wild blaze and hear its sharp crackle, and surrounding you are each of your torn and tattered clansmen. If it sounds like this album is totally absorbed in it's theme, it is. Perhaps for some people this could be overbearing, because the albums incredible devotion to an authentic Celtic sound can be taken as equally cheesy as it can be original and ingenious.
I am in both camps. This album is pure fun and energy, so even with the cheese-level maxed out it's hard to not be uplifted by the album. The drums are roaring and primal, the tremolos go hard and the rasps and growls are perfect bare-bones war chants. By the second track, every instrument is relentless and blistering. This album wastes little of its time with peaceful interludes or any sort of "calm before the storm". It IS the storm, plain and simple through a nearly 58 minute run time. This isn't to say the album isn't peppered with bits of melody. In fact, one of the most aggressive tracks off the album, "Celebration:Son of Nuadh Amhach" has a glimmering, gorgeous guitar solo nearing the end, followed by harsh rasps and soothing woodwinds. The album has such stark yet beautiful contrasts, yet because of the always pervasive energy, it never stops feeling like an album geared entirely towards an ancient war.
With all this in mind, small parts of this album could have certainly been trimmed out. There are a select few tracks that have a bit of awkward excess when they could have easily ended on such perfect notes, e.g the last 20 seconds of "Fury:exile of the orphan", which is basically a somewhat sloppy shred. Thankfully although parts like these detract from the one or two tracks they occur in, they are hardly detrimental to the album as a whole.
So although the term "Celtic war metal" sounds slightly pretentious, and perhaps it sounds like the band is splitting hairs of an already sub-sub-genre, it truly is a perfect definition of what this band is. The hills are alive with the sounds of the Celtic, and atop those hills are Brann Barr.
