Artist: Sons Of Hades
Country: Greece
Label: Floga Records
Formats: LP / Cassette Tape / CD
Year: 2025
Imagine yourself being extremely hungry and you run into the nearest Domino’s or New York Pizza. But you suffer from severe indecisiveness, out of necessity, you opt for the plain pizza that you can top yourself from the start. In the meantime you’re stomach is protesting, it wont accept any delays in getting fed. While you hear Gordon Ramsey yelling “IT’S FUCKING DISGUSTING”, you look at your pizza with far too many ingredients. Not very sophisticated, that’s for sure. Lots of sauce too. But it’s actually quite tasty.
That is more or less how I think Sons Of Hades came together and ended up with ‘Tombs Of The Blind Dead’. This new Greek band, currently signed with Floga Records, is the result of four seasoned musicians who have lots of gained lots of experience in bands such as Embrace Of Thorns, Necrovorous, Necrochakal, Chainsaw, Demolition Train and Nightbreed… A plethora of different bands and styles, and that really shows. Metal-Archives labels this as a Black/Speed Metal band, but that only marginally covers the load.
‘Tombs Of The Blind Dead’ is graced with a cover that feels it could’ve been from the next Hooded Menace album. But in fact Death Metal is basically the only genre that is not represented. Everything else is a part of this crazy mess of multicolour.
This album’s rather sharp guitars, brazen pace and snarly vocals are testament of the musician’s love for bands like Emperor, but if you add some amazing lead work there’s no denying that Mercyful Fate/King Diamond belong to their favourite bands as well. It is thrashy, it’s speedy, it’s heavy and it is blackened. There’s mellower parts with keyboards and clean vocals. And, frankly, ‘Tombs Of The Blind Dead’ feels like a loose canon on deck, a canon that’s heavy and can be deadly, but that has been forgotten to be secured by all the conventional ropes.
Yet, the fun part of it all is that it works remarkably well, granted that you are open minded or at least have a preference for more than just one genre. I can imagine that certain parts are too heavy and the vocals too brutal for the average Power Metal or Heavy Metal fan. Just as I can imagine that it’s too Heavy Metal minded for the die-hard Black Metallers. But, if you happen to like a bit of everything, like me, then ‘Tombs Of The Blind Dead’ is a thoroughly enjoyable record that swings back and forth, from Emperor to Metal Church and from King Diamond to Absu or later Immortal. You have to appreciate the epic atmosphere and the truly marvellous lead guitars.
Certainly something that I would recommend listening before buying. And, just with lots of unconventional stuff, a number of spins is advisable. The flavours blend better with repeated tasting. Who cares what Ramsey says…
