Yasru – ‘Bilinmeze’ (2024)
Rating: 7/10
Release: 10 May 2024
Label: Independent
Yasru is a three-member Turkish folk/doom-metal band and “Bilinmeze” is their sixth full-length album. The album’s only five tracks, but it’s still 33 minutes of music. Heavy, Turkish guttural vocals are joined by some wailing guitars, some unique folk instruments, thick atmosphere, and a supreme heaviness. These folks have been around, and know how to put together some solid tracks.
Let’s just go through them– The album opens with Dünya (“The World”). It’s got a beautiful intro and outro, great vocals, a notable guitar riff, and some hurdy gurdy. It’s a slow burn, but a good one. On its heels, Kozmik Yolculuk (“Cosmic Journey”), sounds appropriately like the title. Grungy, melodic, it’s my favorite track. Gün Batımında (“At Sunset”) is up next, and it’s at this point the album kinda falls off the rails. It’s slow and soulful, and has a great violin intro and some folk sounds throughout. It’s followed by the title track, Bilinmeze (“Unknown”), which is another sad, soulful track. We end on a third slower, sadder, track Son Nefes (“Last Breath”), which feels like a repeated beat. Also, the amount of folkiness diminishes through the second half of the album. It feels like the meme where a well-drawn horse turns into a poorly drawn horse halfway through.
My other complaint is going to be the length. This is too long for an EP, but not long enough to call a full-length album. Other artists who have done this provided more variety in their songs, which made the experience more palatable.
All that aside, the first three tracks are certainly strong and an excellent example of how folk metal can be many, many things given the right talent. Folk meets doom is an exciting concept and Yasru explores, evolves, and extrapolates these ideas into unique and evocative sounds. I wish I knew Turkish, so I can extract more from this because, length and minor content issues aside, Yasru rocks.
Tracklist
- Dunya 08:06
- Kozmik Yolculuk 05:37
- Gün Batımında 05:42
- Bilinmeze 06:56
- Son Nefes 07:22