Ah, Constantinopolis… one immediately imagines the majesty of the Byzantium empire, the siege and fall of Constantinople, Hagia Sofia, the never-stopping crowd on the streets, bustling with life, Turkish delight sweets… but Constantinopolis was also a name of the band hailing from the same city…of course, it’s Instanbul now.
Because we haven’t covered anything Turkish here in Indokult, I think it’s about the time, right?
To be honest, Constantinopolis is a great choice when talking about Turkish metal. First, because starting with the “Intro”, one knows exactly what these guys coming from. OK, it might be a false flag…you know, just using these nice tunes as, well, the intro.
But with the “Wabu the Barbarian”, coming at you straight after the last note of “The Intro” ended, the atmosphere is still present (these guitar riffs are the tell-all sign) and we are delving into Turkish folk metal, albeit with a death metal vein.
The use of the drum machine is evident in the second half of the song (back in the 2002 these were not as sophisticated as they are now), and with the live drummer the overall atmosphere would be even more enhanced, but alas…
Still, I have to say I really love the folk elements here and aforementioned guitar riffs too. For example, in the “The Old World”, which is quite a great song and slowly, but steadily becoming my fave of this little demo, also the intervining of melodies in “Doom”.
And where those guys get some of their inspiration? I am pretty sure Iron Maiden are one source of this, because with the opening of “The Sudden Death”…that’s unmistakable. Not that I will hold that against those Turkish metal warriors, not at all! The change from the death metal growls to the operatic-like battle choruses is quite unexpected and makes for a wonderful experience.
If I discount “Outro” as not a full song, “Dark Room” is a last regular song on this demo. I haven’t expected that, because instead of melodic folk death metal we’re starting with a nice neofolk guitar… and were it not for a distored guitar, I’d would even consider it a sort of a power ballad. Clean voice, accoustic guitar, you know…still, this is a ballad. OK, melodic death metal ballad? There might be a thing like that, why not?
This song, and “The Old World” are definitely my choices from this demo, but don’t take it as a claim the rest of the demo sucks. Quite the contrary, this one is a solid material from the beginning to the end.
I am definitely interested in hearing their other material (the 2003 full-length “For the Empire) before their changed their name (according to the information available, the band renamed as Sabhankra).
So, not bad for the first dip into the waters of Turkish metal…of course, we have a long way to go (and no, I haven’t forgotten about Cenotaph, don’t you worry…)
