Polish band Darzamat already has four studio albums behind them, which were well approved by the audience. Especially their last album Transkarpatia (2005) had a great impact, as the band notes. Their sound is said to be a mixture between symphonic black and death metal, accompanied by symbolic lyrics and a dusky atmosphere. Being a fan of this genre, I was looking forward to review their newest album Solfernus’ Path, which was released August 2009.

Let’s start off with the good things about this album. The sound is indeed very heavy and dusky, I love it. The vocals of male singer Flauros fit the music perfectly and make it sound even darker. Next to that, the drums are very tight and that sound of the guitar.. soo heavy and dark.. brings you in the right mood. Also, the symphonies thoughout all the songs really add something beautiful to it.

The songs on itself are well-structured, with a lot of variation in tempo, melody and power. My personal favorite is Vote For Heresy, a track with awesome riffs. The other tracks are instrumentally of good quality as well though, take for instance Solfernus’ Path or Chimera, very well done.

The album is by the way a concept album, but since I got a download I’m not able to take a look at the lyrics, regretfully. I can notice it however by the overall atmosphere of the album and short instrumental pieces amongst the songs, introducing new parts. This makes the album really into one piece, the tracks follow each other up fluently.

But then the the weakness of the album: I’m just not impressed by the female vocals of Nera. To me there’s no emotion in it, they sound very flat and kind of dull. Most of the time I was dissapointed that her vocals filled in because to me the sound would’ve been a lot better when they were either left out or replaced by a singer with a more gripping voice. This is really the main reason why I scored the album a 6.8; for the rest the album is certainly worth more than that.

I’d say, if you’re not annoyed by Nera’s vocals like I do, Solfernus’ Path is definitely worth listening to, as it’s instrumentally very strong and tight and the male vocals are very good. But if you are, you’d best leave it.