Concrete Age - Awaken the Gods

Well well well. How many times do you see a band releasing more than one album in less than 12 months...few, very few. But that's exactly what the extreme metal boys at Concrete age have done, either they've got a magic wand or they are endlessly talented, impressive either way.

After we were treated to Motherless in early 2025, the London based band has released their 11th full length album, Awaken the gods and it carries on in the same vein as Motherless. For the uninitiated, Concrete age is an extreme metal band that fuses elements of Thrash, MeloDeath and Extreme metal with regional folk elements. The band is adept at putting together a sonic tempest using instruments like Accodrion, Bongos and various regional string instruments, of course with a healthy helping of distortion heavy riffs, blast beats, thumping bass work and vocals that have been through the cheese grater. All the good things.

Its not all just go fast and crazy with your instruments on this album, while the band's music is definitely one of extreme nature, the mid sections and bridges in some of the songs slow things down a notch which provides a nice break, perspective and depth to the songs. Take the first track for example, at about the 4:47 mark the song breaks the tachycardic beats tempo to a very mellow middle eastern inspired bridge (I could half imagine myself watching a belly dancing show).

Now I was hoping to hear some sick percussions like the last album which had blitzing bongos (think Raida Raida) and some accordion work but it is all missing from this album. Its a different flavour but that's what this band is all about, they are good at picking any regional instruments and blending it with heavy metal and creating their own unique blend and brand of music. Concrete age has created their own tiny little cove and niche which is expanding by the day.

Awaken the gods stands at a crisp run time of just under 42 mins and with 10 songs to boot, you know there is no time for messing about. Right at the start you're treated to the familiar sounds one would expect from the band and "Prey for me" is a great track to start with. Neatly performed guitar riffs, bass with a serious twang, loads of blast beats mixed with a healthy dose of Eastern string instrument and of course, seriously heavy vocal work by Ilia deliver the much expected punch.

Forbidden ministry and the title track follow next and pretty much continue on the same vein to dole out oodles of head banging material. Cursed reincarnation is the band's best work on this album and both Morozov and Zahariev do a fantastic job and show off their guitar chops with a very thrash riff that runs through the track and neat but razor sharp solos. Ilia is great as usual and delivers the chorus with weight and impact. Oozing with raw, steroid laced and testosterone fuelled masculinity, this is a great song on all levels.

The next 2 tracks that follow (Mid east boogie & Warrior's anthem) have a bit more groove to them. These tracks also show the shift in the band's sound from the previous album and sport a more middle eastern aesthetic. While I'm more of a "beat my head in with a sledge hammer" kind of guy when it comes to music, it's hard not to enjoy what Concrete age have dished out with these 2 tracks. "Where storms are gathered" and "Sorrows of the flesh" are both solid tracks and deliver exactly what you expect from the band and solid additions to the band's growing body of work. The bongos make a come back in "Sorrows of the flesh" albeit briefly. I loved it. Absolutely loved it.

Then you have the final 2 tracks of the album. What the fuck.

Bora Bora and Simarik presented in a metal avatar. Utter cringeworthy materal.

If you don't know BoraBora is an Iranian pop song and Simarik is the viral and famous track by a Turkish singer that came out some 15 years ago. Both songs were famous and made headlines when they were released and played almost endlessly on the airwaves. It beats me why anyone would want to create a metal cover, it might be appealing for the first 7 seconds but the minute you scratch the surface you'll see both these songs are rich in composition which leaves you with very little creativity or space to work with. What you end up with are songs where you've replaced instruments in the original track with guitars and bass and drums and added solos and blast beats. That’s it. Simarik was a pain to sit through with the band deciding to replace the "kiss kiss" sound in the song with the sound of the cocking of a revolver. I found it so cringeworthy I had to down a pint of gasoline just to clear my system.

It beats me why a band so talented would want to add these 2 tracks. Maybe they had to get 10 songs on the album and had run out of time or they actually thought this was a good idea, who knows.

The 2 tracks aside, the album is another good piece of work by a very talented bad that's actually delivering folk metal that's rich, varied, enjoyable and not formulaic (Bloodywood, anyone?). Even though it’s a notch below what Concrete Age delivered with Motherland and not their best work it still is a very good album and worth spending your time and money on. I hope the band will continue to write more material and bring their own special brand of metal to the masses. Till then, happy listening and stay metal

---

For more, visit the following links: Instagram | Bandcamp  | Spotify