Another review of Desire Rage was born. This one was released by German server
Powermetal.de. You can read it in original
here, English translation in this article. Author of the review is Walter Scheurer.
For long years already fight Czech Warchild through the local underground scene, but till now they were hardly taken into account outside of borders of their country. Sometime in 1997 two guitarists Aleister (Aleš Hrnčál) and Samael (Petr Krabs) joined together to excel in hardest metal, they didn’t succeed in looking for the suitable drummer though.
This circumstance literally forced Warchild to depend on drum machine in the future, which you could then hear not only on the first demo “Krvavá cesta“ (2001), but also on debut album “Looking Back“ (2005). Although the bassist Nestorat was recruited meanwhile and Marky behind keyboards became integral part of the band, Warchild is still missing the drummer.
Why this fact has to be described to such extent, is above all explained in the fact that album “Desire & Rage“ would excel even more, if there would be drummer of flash and bones playing. This biting and still enough aggressive Czech mixture, blended together from just about same portions of old school thrash and black and death metal of the first generation, suffers namely from cumbrous and one-dimensional rhythmics.
Guys (and velvet girl at keyboards) try hard, with all the aggressiveness, not to fall into foreseeable way of music. Especially with their guitar technique they overcome surely all the doubts. Regrettably, they’ve got, especially in the fast parts, certain deficiency as for the forcibility, which in my opinion origins from a little insufficient and mindless rhythm line.
In spite of this the guys succeed through numerous tempo changes, but also through folkloric interludes like in “Old Man’s Legend“, to create very good diversity and they don’t even avoid doom interludes reminding of old Celtic Frost. “Desire & Rage“ is but in the first place formed by throughout fierce and aggressive, but also exceedingly skillfully sounding, way of guitar play of both protagonists.
On the contrary in the vocal technique both guitarists don’t offer anything marvellous and move entirely around genre-typical growling and screeching. Nevertheless they’ve got well-developed sense for escalation of atmosphere through voice changes. Also Marky, the lady on keyboards, is allowed to mic now and then, but only sporadically and so she can’t become stable part of things.
Because Aleister and Samael are really gifted guitar virtuosos, as testified by partly progressive parts and especially by untold solos, the finale of this CD shouldn’t surprise as well. The bonus “Canon In D Major“, which Warchild inserted as the last – although as for style not very fitting – song, is symphonic instrumental composition, which could as well be originating from a rather bombastic metal oriented band.
All summed up, “Desire & Rage“ in spite of indicated handicaps makes overall positive impression and playing technique is at high level. I personally was the most addressed by real thrashings like surpassingly brutal “Burning“ or “Warrior“, which tends to technical death metal, as because of the Czechs' rather impetuous style even the grave rhythmic problems appear to be rather natural.
