This might just be THE album of the year...

If Pagan Altar won't release a new album this year, then I'm sure Germany's Atlantean Kodex will release the best album of 2010. It's entitled The Golden Bough, and what I've heard of it is simply mindblowing. It's like a mix of Hammerheart/Twilight of the Gods-era Bathory, Into Glory Ride-era Manowar and Solstice. Check out the song Pilgrim (Through the Ruins of Europa) at their myspace: www.myspace.com/atlanteankodex




Tracklist:

I. Fountain of Nepenthe - 10:14
II. Pilgrim - 11:32
III. The White Goddess - 0:56
IV. Temple of Katholic Magick - 9:05
V. Disciples of the Iron Crown - 4:13
VI. Vesperal Hymn - 6:24
VII. The Atlantean Kodex - 7:26
VIII.A Prophet in the Forest - 16:14
IX.The Golden Bough - 2:04

Was going to mock and say: What kind of Kotex? But that's pretty good. I hear a little early Candlemass too which shows how simple I am.

Atlantean Kotex... Would make for an interesting band, haha. Now that you mention it, I can hear some Epicus/Nightfall influences in there as well.

Album of the year? I couldn't take anymore at 5:00. Not my thing I guess.

Where's the "WWWHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRG!!!"

Know nothing of this band. Give us a description/review.

Since I are lazy bastards (yes, that is on purpose), I'll copy the description from last.fm:

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Bavaria (2006 – present)
Almost nothing certain is known about this enigmatic outfit from the northern forests of the kingdom of Bavaria. Formed around 2006 by Trummer and Kreuzer, the band quickly managed to become the centre of the new european epic metal movement. Their disturbing “Pnakotic demos”, released in 2007, was praised by journalists and fans all over the world as one of the best Epic Metal albums ever.

Rooted deeply in the sound of Bathory, old Manowar, Solstice and Manilla Road, Atlantean Kodex deliver an unbelievably heavy mixture of dramatic hymns, harmonic twin guitars and fantastic melodies, telling tales of lost worlds and ages past. With one foot the past and the other in the present, Atlantean Kodex bridge the gap between the elder world and now, between dream and reality. What the future holds, even the wisest cannot say…

We are the Urkraft
We are the sacred force
We strike with the wrath of the rightful
We wield the invincible Puritan blade

The album will be released on October 2nd. Their demo/EP The Pnakotic Demos was rereleased last month, and although it's really good, it seems the album will be much, much better. The EP does have some extremely killer songs though. The lyrics mostly deal with Bavarian (South German) folklore and nostalgia for "the good old days" (while at the same time insisting that "the good old days" are simply an effect of modern ideology, that how I got it at least. Deep huh?). The songs on the album are supposed to be pretty diverse. Most are slow, epic songs (like Pilgrim), Vesperal Hymn is a ballad, Disciples of the Iron Crown is supposed to be a fast, galloping song ala Run to the Hills and The White Goddess and The Golden Bough are nice little acoustic tracks.

I dig it...

T-Roy wrote:

Where's the "WWWHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRG!!!"

Maybe that's why I'm digging it...

First I want to note, that I'm listening because this is what I do when people post, not because of anything unnecessary like 'best album of the year'.

Thoughts. This is a good band. I want to just totally unleash and be completely triumphant and so forth during 'Pilgrim', but the vocal ideas that really stick VS those that don't are not well balanced. This is not the case with the compared-to bands..Viking Bathory, Manilla Road, etc. In terms of the voice itself, this feels refreshing somehow, and I find it to be a highlight of the sound.

Basically, this song could be like WHOOAAAAAA, but instead, I feel this BEGGING for a monster vocal melody to be let out at some point, and by the end of the song, it doesn't get it's wish. I will still check out some other songs from the album as they are available.

I could see that. It's one thing that happens with doom, sometimes I want the vocals to really step it up and not all of them can do that.

Orion Crystal Ice wrote:

First I want to note, that I'm listening because this is what I do when people post, not because of anything unnecessary like 'best album of the year'.

Thoughts. This is a good band. I want to just totally unleash and be completely triumphant and so forth during 'Pilgrim', but the vocal ideas that really stick VS those that don't are not well balanced. This is not the case with the compared-to bands..Viking Bathory, Manilla Road, etc. In terms of the voice itself, this feels refreshing somehow, and I find it to be a highlight of the sound.

Basically, this song could be like WHOOAAAAAA, but instead, I feel this BEGGING for a monster vocal melody to be let out at some point, and by the end of the song, it doesn't get it's wish. I will still check out some other songs from the album as they are available.

Hmm, I get what you mean. Check out this clip though:



This is the fast 'un, and at the end you can hear a snippet of the chorus. Is that triumphant enough for ya?

And here's demo of another song that'll be on the LP:

Not bad. Album of the year? Probably not for me, but I do like what I hear. And yea, the name is too similiar to Kotex Tampons.

The music is awesome.

Ha, I'm just a sucker for slow, heavy, epic stuff I guess.

Dave the Boss wrote:

Ha, I'm just a sucker for slow, heavy, epic stuff I guess.

Nothing wrong with that. I'm actually liking this the more I hear it. I didn't have high expectations based on your description (Bathory?, Manowar?), but it's not bad at all.

I like what I am hearing with the song Pilgrim.....

Not bad at all. I like it.

sounds like racist anti-semetic music.

That's not too bad. May be worth checking out.

ZetaReticuli wrote:

sounds like racist anti-semetic music.

What makes you think that?

Now to dispel the idea that this is a racist band...

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Your lyrics convey feelings of home as well as alienation. Alongside the imagery of battle and values such as honor, how easy is it to make Atlantean Kodex the soundtrack for your next local Nazi disco?

I think there is one crucial element missing in our lyrics in order to allow a political interpretation: the idea of nation. All our texts prevent mentioning distinct time and place. Our feelings of alienation remain within the myth and describe distances that are not to be measured in years or miles, so it becomes hard to interpret the lyrics in such a way. You cannot help complete idiots, of course, but I do think that we are relatively safe from misinterpretation.

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Both traditional metal and heathen circles like to blather about roots. Is it actually possible nowadays to trace back your existence to one distinct origin, considering how much everything got mixed up through the ages – from “races” to musical crossover, the roots of which only few listeners seem to be aware of?

First of all, the concept of “race“ is, from a biological point of view, bollocks. It is surely impossible to draw direct lines of continuity back to the Germanic tribes or the early Stone Age, as the Wicca movement does. You just have to be aware of the migration that has occurred throughout the last six thousand years even in relatively small areas. Even if you restrict your investigations to a secluded area like the Upper Palatinate, for example, you cannot find your individual roots. This is because the moving Germanic Tribes, Slavs or Francs have all left their marks, starting from the Mid Stone Age across the Celtic and Roman period along the Limes Wall.
So whenever today especially right wing and esoteric groups are searching for “Germanic roots”, they are lying to themselves, as they completely neglect the results of all the research that has been done within the last fifty-two years. It’s simply a fact now that the origins of Halloween are not found among the Celts, but for the first time in a French Benedictine monastery in the early Middle Ages. Similarly, Easter does not refer to the goddess Ostara, which has never existed; it simply alludes to the Old High German word for the red in the sky at dawn, as this has been the time of day for the Christian Easter Mass since the early Middle Ages. The Advent Wreath is no Old Germanic symbol of fertility, but an invention by a protestant scholar from the late 19th century.
Eventually, these fabricated lines of continuity are based on ideology anyway. People that claim such things have no interest in the truth, because it does not fit into their world. All the bands that keep posing with drinking horns, deem themselves Vikings or descendants of the old Germanic people due to their swilling mead and praying to Odin therefore are nothing but a huge carnival scene – just like the majority of “new heathen religions.” They have a good show going on with costumes and stuff – but in the end, they are as heathen as the Pope.
You cannot transfer all that to heavy metal, though. We are still close to the origins of the music, and thanks to modern media these are perfectly preserved and well documented, which is not the case with so-called “heathendom”. Reconstruction in that case happens through assumption, interpretation and fallacy that is owing to ideology. In terms of speaking about the roots of heavy metal, we might be guided by ideology as well, yet we can refer to the actual sources and have real proof at hand to support our argument. In this way, we can look at the roots and reconstruct the original stylistic devices, values and attitudes. We are able to recognize the roots and tell what innovation, change and continuity are – granted, though, that we treat the sources seriously and thoroughly examine tradition as well as the origins. Also, it helps to know about heavy metal history – and that is exactly where I see a crucial lack nowadays. It gets tricky as soon as people without a clue spread their ignorance through internet fanzines and forums. Suddenly, bands like Sunno))), My Dying Bride or The Sword become doom metal, and the boundaries and lines of orientation within heavy metal culture start to blur. It gets arbitrary and disappears at a certain point. This is the reason why we need the knowledge and must be aware of the origins and tradition. If anything becomes metal, then soon nothing will be metal anymore.

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Anyway, the thing with the Neo-Nazi soundtrack:
I was asking myself the same question lately. In fact our lyrics with their tales of a lost glorious age, the folklore of our home region and the chosen few who won't fit in in this modern day age DO have some kind of appeal for modern right-wing scenes. This will especially be true with the new album, which will focus even more on Europe and its traditions and people.
If you compare the regressive approach in our music with the regressive ideologies in contemporary right-wing groups, especially the French Nouvelle Droite with authors like de Benoist, there are some parallels. For example, the aspect of alienation from oneself and one's environment as a result of the materialistic values of our modern age. Another thing is our mentioning of old Indo-European gods. The same you can find in the new right-wing esoteric and neopagan scenes, who demand to abolish christianity as an "imported religion" and go back to the true European gods, who are "characteristic for the German race". Talk about blood and soil here. The whole pagan metal scene is full of that kind of bollocks. I hope nobody will put us in the same category.

Source: http://atlanteankodex.forumprofi.de/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=12

So I just got this in earlier today. Wow. Just... wow. This album is mindblowing. The last time I was this impressed by an album was when While Heaven Wept released Vast Oceans Lachrymose last year. The Golden Bough is the new benchmark for epic heavy metal. Musically the album also features parts that really remind me of Warlord and early Fates Warning. Lyrically this album is also AMAZING!

It isn't often that an album this long (65 minutes) keeps me interested the whole time... something the guys from Maiden have yet to learn. So far this is the best album I've heard this year, and I'm guessing that it'll remain at the top. Highly, HIGHLY recommend.

Oh, and for the record: there's no racist/antisemitic/nazi/occult/satanic lyrics to be found here. They deal with folk legends, traditions, isolation, longing and even Roman Catholicism, while also being very well written and thought out.

Time to give this 'un a well deserved kick up the back side. I've been spinning this to death ever since I got it, and I'm still loving this. Here's two of my favorites from the album:





The sound quality here is pretty bad though, the CD sounds a lot better.