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Dragonauta: Omega pentagram
11/09/13 || gk
Argentina’s Dragonauta started life in the late 90s, somewhat heavily inspired by Sleep but taking that music into a more Satanic/ occult direction. It was with 2010s Cruz invertida that the band managed to carve out its own space and sound in the genre and it was a pretty good album. So now, in 2013 the band has released their fourth and latest album “Omega pentagram” and business has picked up.
There’s an atmosphere in this album that is sort of unique. The songs for the most part are deliberately mid-paced and maintain a chugging sense of progression. Equal parts metal, doom and space rock, the album weaves its way through 52 minutes of some high quality music. I. The talking snake II. The witch hammer stands out early in the album with its tempo remaining much the same throughout but the riffs progress seamlessly. Mid album highlight I am the frost thrones is the first sign of the band upping the tempo and it’s a great fucken song. This is a real riff fest as it moves between chugging mid paced riffs to full blown lead guitar freak outs, an awesome doom riff for the chorus and a memorable melodic guitar line to close out the song. The album closes with the epic “Black horn messiah” and it’s a 10 minute adventure of unpredictable song writing. The band takes a dissonant melody and plays around it for a good ten minutes to stunning effect and it’s a perfect closer to “Omega pentagram”.
This band sounds like a well-oiled machine here. There are plenty of parts through the album where they sound like they’re just jamming but a lot of thought has gone into it. The music too has taken on a slightly more retro feel at times sounding like a modern version of Cirith Ungol or old Trouble. Alejandro Gómez and Daniel Libedinsky star with their guitar playing but the rhythm section is rock solid as well.
The one aspect of the album that I’m not too happy with are the vocals. José Luis “Topo” Arnetta handles bass and vocals and his singing just isn’t very powerful. Luckily, the band doesn’t really use a lot of vocals on this album and much of it is used to accentuate the music. At times, Dragonauta come across like a non-death metal version of The Chasm. The songs display the same penchant for meandering but often unpredictable riffing where it’s more about the journey than the destination.
Dragonauta has really delivered the goods on “Omega pentagram”. The songs are all high quality but this is an album that needs to be heard in its entirety. There’s an atmosphere at work here that takes its time in unraveling but then effortlessly sucks you in. “Omega pentagram” gets better with every listen and fans of doom or even straight up heavy metal should really dig this one out.
- Information
- Released: 2013
- Label: Tommy Gun Entertainment
- Website: Dragonauta Facebook
- Band
- Daniel Libedinsky: guitars
- Alejandro Gómez: guitars
- José Luis “Topo” Arnetta: bass
- Ariel Solito: drums
- Tracklist
- 01. Frozen Neptunian Demons
- 02. I. The Talking Snake II. The Witch Hammer
- 03. Nautilus 666
- 04. Seven Rings of Saturn
- 05. I Am the Frost Thrones
- 06. Jupiterian Sword of Annihilation
- 07. Iron Planet
- 08. Black Horn Messiah
