Origin:	Russia
Genres:

Last update/review:	July 20, 2015

Rakoth

Rakoth is one of those offbeat groups for whom terms such as "experimental", "avant-garde", and "eclectic" are invariably used in a vain attempt to describe their style. The debut, Planeshift is itself a rather strange album loosely in the melodic black metal camp, but it's downright ordinary compared to Tiny Deaths, an album that essentially defies conventional metallic comparisons. There are noticeable traditional Russian folk influences, ambient piano interludes, a bit of black metal (but only a bit), some atmospheric doom, even some techno thrown into the mix, with no two songs really sounding the same. Suffice to say that those into basic headbanging or extreme thrashing might not take to Rakoth, but those who favor the experimental left-field groups might find something of interest here. Tiny Deaths is not a perfect album, as some of the quieter songs seem to be a little too experimental and meandering, but it's one of the more diverse and unusual albums this reviewer has heard in some time, and one intriguing listen.

Some 11 years later came the band's fourth album, Ars Compilata, which by one report somewhat blends the weirdness of Tiny Deaths with some of the more standard structures of their earlier works.