For the true and passionate Lovers of Music: 20 years of "That within Blood ill-tempered"

SHAI HULUD were following their masterpiece "Hearts once nourished with Hope and Compassion" 6 long years later with their second full length "That within Blood ill-tempered"... and the only one surviving from back then was mastermind Matt Fox. Matt Fletcher joined in 1998 and the new shouter Gert Van der Velde in 1999. So they had enough time to find their footing. And it panned out. "That within Blood ill-tempered" was everything you'd wish from a sophomore full length.

At first I had a hard time getting into it. The sound is different, the hooks are not as present and don't hit that hard, the singalongs are not as iconic, the production is more subtle and restrained. And the songwriting got even more complex and layered, they didn't want to hold the same rhythm or pace for 20 seconds straight, even if their live would've depend on it. At first glance the whole record blends together and you -as the listener- are like "what the fuck is going on?". 

But eventually I got their approach and I just love this evolution. Surprisingly enough they Matt Fox was able to retrieve A LOT of their trademarks. You'll get dozens of awesome, classic HULUD-moments with this. But the context is quite different. Their approach is pretty artistic, from the ever-present, dream-y guitars to the ultra-nervous songwriting, to the consequent one-way-character of the songs to the fact that they kinda blend together to one huge song. It's a cool and creative progression of their sound. Gert on vocals fits perfectly with his more melodic, emotional style -compared to Chad Gilbert before- and the record is a winner front to back...

...yet they kinda over did it with the breaks. The second half of the 8-minute-long closer -with its straight rhythm and some pure mosh- shows that the record could've rivaled "Hearts once nourished with Hope and Compassion" with some more streamlined moments here and there. It's nitpicking anyway, cause HULUD delivered two awesome albums in a row and "That within Blood ill-tempered" is miles above everything they did after. They had something going with this new formulation of their style and I'd loved if they'd built on it... instead they signed with Metal Blade and delivered the worst album in their career, "Misantrophy Pure". 

If you haven't checked out "That within Blood ill-tempered" or SHAI HULUD yet, then do yourself a favor and try to get into their earlier stuff before and THEN check out their second album. 

Songs I recommend: "Two and Twenty Misfortunes"; "Being Exemplary".

Check it out