Patria
Nihil Est Monastica

April 2013
Released: 2013, Drakkar Productions
Rating: 3.5/5
Reviewer: Metal-Rules.com UK Team

I’d not heard Patria before being handed the album to lend my opinion to, and thus was pleasantly surprised. It’s black metal, but perhaps not as we know it. It’s all here; dirty blast beats, drone riffs interspersed with some inspired guitar playing, some fairly epic cadences; tortured, vociferous vocals and much more besides, but it’s everything else going on that has me hooked.



While being steeped in traditional black metal sensibilities, this Brazillian duo is not afraid to take things slightly further afield and shake up their sound a bit. With ‘Nihil Est Monastica’ we are taken on a bit of a BM journey. I go from being reminded of Burzum one minute, (all grainy and raggedly beautiful,) Dissection in the next, (that interlacing, unpredictable guitar work and startling changes of pace) and even to shades of Slayer’s earlier years (I know they’re not BM, but have a listen to the album and perhaps you’ll see what I mean.)

t any rate, it sounds like the boys enjoyed making this album, and that shows. ‘Nyctophilia’ makes me want to start a circle pit in my living room.



With Triumphsword handling the vocals, which do add menace but could perhaps be used a bit more sparingly, my sleuth-like research tells me that the talented Mantus handles all instrumentation on the album, and this is very impressive.

The drums are fairly rough, but they’ve worked with what they have and it adds to their sound. The music is of a consistent quality and the songs to kept to a user-friendly length, so at no point was I left waiting for the track to finish and the next to start. One small concession I may make is that the songs seem to lack direction at some points, but this is made up for with the consistently outstanding abrasive-yet-melodic guitar work.



A very good offering and definitely recommended for fans of the genre. Besides, Brazilian black metal as a genre has a nice ring to it I think.



Review by Kevin Griffiths