Overlord - Overland / ...is Everywhere

OVERLORD - Overland / ...is Everywhere (DEFENSE / MYTHRONE - CD 2018)

Overlord was a Polish death metal band, formed in 1992 and active until 2000. In these few years they released only a couple of demos and one album ("In the World of Time" in 1998), but I think they managed to get a solid feedback from the Polish underground of the mid to late 90's. I remember that interviews with them were in every Polish fanzine possible haha! But Overlord have never been among my favourite bands, so I don't really have many good memories about them. It's nice though to see both their old demos pressed on CD compilation, it's always cool to come back to some stuff, which you haven't listened to in ages. 

So, I sat down, started to play the CD... and quickly got bored haha! Let me be honest, Overlord was nothing but just mediocre Polish death metal band and there was nothing special about their music. At least I do not hear anything such. But their second and better of the two, demo "Overland" is pretty cool and solid, I do quite like it, even if such technical and a bit melodic, mid paced death metal is not my favourite thing. But they did it well, definitely you could pick some Death or Atheist influences in these songs and technically it's been very well played, with production value that is also not bad at all. Good compositions, interesting ideas and arrangements, so everything works fine on this demo. What I like especially is that all these old demos have that vicious, rough feel, even if the music is not bulldozing death metal, but something more tranquil. But it’s harsh and aggressive anyway. Songs like "Walls" or "Numbers" are the best, there are some great catchy riffs there! Generally, I think this is a solid, worthy demo. 

"...is Everywhere" demo is much less interesting. The production is quite poor and makes the whole demo even less enjoyable. But the songwriting is also pretty bad, nowadays it all sounds just dull, primitive and almost naive. I don’t think there was even one moment on this demo, which I would really enjoy, it’s that annoying and most boring style of death metal I could ever think of. I couldn’t really go through these 35 minutes too much and I doubt I will be back to "...is Everywhere" often. 

So, what is my opinion about Overlord nowadays? I still think that it's just mediocre band from those old days and there wasn't anything special about them. But "Overland" demo is definitely good enough to be checked, so it's a good reason to get this CD, because there won't be a better quality than this. CD comes with a nice booklet with some band photos, lyrics and liner notes from some zine editors, etc. 

Standout tracks: “Walls”, “Numbers” 

Verdict: 60/100