Side A:
Side B:
Belantara were one of the most intriguing Metal bands of Southeast Asia and one of its most well-guarded secrets. It's tempting to declare them the Best Band Of The Area, but as often is the case the truth is a bit more complicated than that.
Their discography is uneven even by Malaysian standards and I will hopefully delve deeper into their early output in the future, but for now we're gonna dive into my fave album of theirs - their unique swansong "Infiniti".
First the bad news: Only 3 songs on "Infiniti" would be considered Metal. However (and here's comes the good news) every one of these 3 tracks will BLOW - YOUR - MIND. I do hear how much this sounds like hyperbole but really, "Mereka" is a doomic, pounding perfect mix of Lordian Guard and mid 90's Virgin Steele with an unmistakenly Asian twist. If everything would have gone downhill from here, the album would still have been worth hunting down for this excellent opener alone. The extra-goodness does however continue at the start of side B, where we are presented with another proud, epic Metal-march in the form of "Daya Tarikan".
And so, finally, there is the majestic "Destinasi Infiniti". With its unforgettable anthemic chorus (Zaid's hoarse vocals really wields its magic here), this tune definitely belongs in my Top-10 of Epic Metal faves and stylewise it actually have more simililarities with later day Epic Metal bands like Atlantean Codex, Doomsword or Solstice.
We do however need to discuss some of the remaining material to give a clearer picture of exactly what kind of a hodge-podge of an album this is:
"Lautan Cahaya" and "Telefon" represents the aor(!?)-side of the band, their only redeeming factor being the slightly gloomier than average vibe. "Dikau Yang Berbeda" is one puny step up on the Heaviness-ladder, an at least half-decent melodic hardrocker. The remaining 4 tracks are ballads, ranging from the basic awul ones to the somewhat heavier "Jalan Pulang", up to the one great oddity:
"Pelita Ketenangan". It begins like any other Malay-filler-schmallad, but halfway into the song it flowers into quite the hymn and if I were to edit down "Infiniti" into a 4-song Mini-LP, this would be a perfect finale!