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Forced Equal

by Tankist

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olematvs. The entire album is all-out war.

Unconditional support from France!
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  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      €10 EUR

     

  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Extended version digipak CD with silver foil logo on the front cover, including three bonus tracks:

    11. The Dictator (Magnus cover)
    12. Xenos (ft. Ivo Laanelind)
    13. 1949 Overture (instrumental)

    Includes unlimited streaming of Forced Equal via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    ships out within 7 days
    Purchasable with gift card

      €15 EUR or more 

     

  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Expanded digipak CD featuring 3 bonus tracks + premium quality print on demand T-shirt.

    We have teamed up with a local print shop who makes use of the latest DTG printing technology to achieve a level of detail and ultra smooth color gradients unheard of in classic screen-printed t-shirts. Produced one by one as ordered so each shirt undergoes individual quality control before being shipped.

    Printed by MG Disain on high end Stanley/Stella Creator organic cotton stock approved by PETA and the Fair Wear Foundation. Designed by Fengarm.

    Wash inside out at 40 degrees Celsius to ensure the longevity of your shirt!

    Includes unlimited streaming of Forced Equal via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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    Purchasable with gift card

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  • Full Digital Discography

    5
    releases

    Get all 5 Tankist releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of Forced Equal, Kon kuradi kotsil ma elä? (single), Doom (single), Unhuman, and Be Offended (EP). , and , .

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1.
The Gulag Archipelago 05:28
lyrics
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Perpetrators crowned and control given. By grace of orders survive, by the orders die. The persecutors had in time made us all give in, defiled and made us lie. No refuge. No shrines. Grit is death. Life is... Life is throwaway, decay, degraded, distorted and flayed to a pawn for the power play. The camps are but a chain of distress secluded, it’s either ache or repress. Not by mistake but by design there is no life, survive or die! “A single death is a tragedy; a million a statistic.” We’re suffering a travesty, directed by sadistic executioners and slayers, we’re numbers to them. “Death solves all problems – no man, no problem.”
2.
Paragraph 58 03:23
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Straight-backed and rigid in pride, I keep my country clean. To send the filth from sight to hide no mean is too mean, and I mean it! Uah! State-backed and true and tried, I’ll make you be pristine. I’d not dare where you shall bide to see what you see and demean it! It’s fifty eight, confess and sue, or drag your family down too with the ten that is coming for you! Crushed and punished, pissed on and beat down, we’ll wreck your will! Left still, living yet killed. No more! To no avail. No more! Swept away. Acclaim accompanies the farce while curtains reek of rotting. Tomorrow still remains in dark by which arrests are being plotted.
3.
The More Equal 03:56
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Do you comprehend the gravity of the situation: a cellar like yours, its walls speak of fears, and these cuffs from your belt now locked against you, you’re done. The days of self-decoration and privilege... Gone! You and the boys from the OGPU have been keeping an eye on all that I do. Strip off the uniform, it doesn’t suit a rat, think thrice before trying to catch the cat! Unjust law shall spawn. Loathe and love the more equal. You don’t comprehend the gravity of the situation: a cellar like yours, its walls speak of fears, and these orders from higher up now turned against you, it’s done. The days of self-decoration and privilege... Gone! Me and the boys from the OGPU have been keeping an eye on all that you do. Strip off that uniform, it doesn’t suit a snake! You were the kaluga but now you are bait! Unjust law shall spawn. Loathe and love the more equal.
4.
Commandant's Orders 03:25
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Our path of arrival was lost before sunrise. Can’t see the trudger ahead. Can’t hear the marcher behind. Rocks collapsed to bury two brothers. Commandant charges, “Reform your row!” Pohuy ‘bout Vova, didn’t know the other, sleeping their last now. “The Sun is low!” Orders that won’t give us time for grief. “Those who stand will not need to eat!” Even taking heat, we freeze to the marrow. If typhus doesn´t take, we’ll toil tomorrow. MONGRELS! ZEK WRETCHES! MARCH! What little there is in his pockets I thief, few matches, stubs and... ”Dig no grave!” Deceased so tranquil stare in relief. May the dead rest. “It’s time to slave!” The snow glows grim in the red twilight. “March to the barracks until there is light!” Each day from home we're more in dire, the road by each night is longer than prior. У кого сила, тот и прав! From the empty farmlands the longest roads begin, where homes are lost forever, where waters run still. Below these roads the makers: hands that ground in cold, orders of commandants and skins frozen on bones.
5.
Durak 03:39
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How about some fun and games, we’re all friends here, dare say nay? Hey comrade! You deal the deck! Everybody! Place your bets! And the bottle gets passed around, and the claps and cheers resound. Some is lost, some is won, how about another run? Now! Game turns gambling, stakes get higher, card house crumbles, men don’t tire. New blood places in a fortune, one he owns of mere a portion. And the bottle gets passed around, and you’d hear a needle hit the ground. Cards are set, but they forsake him. What is due is always taken! Now, where’s that bold prize, we don’t get off on only tears and cries! Do you recall my face, my house, recall my street... my pain? We wrote home, we put her on the train. Cards were set, and they forsook him. What was due will all be taken. Sees in windows wither flowers as he knows what’s his, is ours. Ours, ours, ours, ours, ours, for hours.
6.
Six In One 03:08
lyrics
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Strip off those clothes, we’re turning on the heat! Six in one! A chilling performance of ripping skin and meat! Six in one! No time for dormancy, don’t be sour, sweet! No one will help you now... He’s yours, but you’re ours to use, bitch! Screaming and writhing, you only turn us on! Six in one! Splitting and spiking, new slits to serve us all. Six in one! No time for dormancy, don’t be quiet, doll! No one will help you now... He’s yours, but you’re ours to use, bitch! Screaming loud, she’s the suite, the sextet plays and makes her sound! With cold wire her shape is bound. As she gets passed around. Locks eyes with cruelty, no nerve to look away. Six in one! Trying to endure her cries, no chance to halt decay. Six in one! No time for dormancy, once he won’t betray! No one will help you now... He’s yours, but you’re ours to use, bitch! Screaming loud, she’s the suite, the sextet plays and makes her sound! With cold wire his hands are bound. As she gets passed around. Finally fed to the hounds.
7.
Cold Crawler 05:57
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One lacerated mind, one tied and untwined as bleeding glaciers solidify dismal distances. And twisting and turning and cunningly burning and hate leads its way and will. Kill or guide me, cold crawler! Redefine me, enthraller! One obscuring blind, one tide to confine as wayward passages crystallize wicked purposes. And twisting and turning and cunningly burning and hate leads its way to kill.
8.
Purity Spiral (ft. Lembetu) 04:08
lyrics
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Divide! Distrust what you are shown. Collide! Untold and what is known! Justified! Remembrance ripped from stone. Agitprop runs the wells of truth deplete. Sky drops painted blood when I complete. Reality and facts don’t matter anymore... Agitators perturbed by coercion of the superb, all answers are curbed. Revolution eats its own. Propagandists overthrown. Purity spiral will dethrone. Inciting and instigating, predator has become the prey. For the predetermined baiting, threat of payback grants the pay. Demoralize and destabilize! Satisfied and content, righteously malevolent. Seemingly an accident. What is worthless can’t be spent. Reality and facts don’t matter anymore… Agitators perturbed by coercion of the superb, all answers are curbed. Revolution eats its own, Propagandists overthrown. Purity spiral will dethrone.
9.
One Crippling Thought 03:51
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10.
Of Bitter Freedom 04:18
lyrics
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Soviet hell, for the sinner and saint a cell. For most who enter, their hungry fate knells death and torment. I have endured, I’ve been allured! Run, hide, spite, wrawl, fight the bright nightfall... Bitter freedom behind the wire calls too vast to fathom. Exhausted, I push against the glow, moving forwards, but I’m moving slow. Fingers blacken, I wander trails of deaths and waded breaths. Storm, ice, fright, squall, fight the bright nightfall... Bitter freedom behind the wire hurts too vast to fathom. Pursue my trails passing through doom. You must prevail! Assail death! Confusion, I drop into the snow, I wail forlorn, but my strength is low. Echoes answer, conundrums in my eyes. Am I free to die? Dread, calm, light, thrall, fight the bright nightfall... Bitter freedom behind the wire lurks too vast to fathom. Assail death!

about

Forced Equal is the sophomore album by the Estonian metal band Tankist, released on June 28th 2023. Dealing with the gruesome topic of totalitarian repressions on the example of Soviet forced labor camps, the album builds on thrash metal with avant-garde black and death metal influences.

"In recent years, I don’t exactly recall coming across any band that utilizes this kind of progressive and well-thought-out songwriting with combined elements of three extreme metal subgenres, giving us a very hybrid release that is unlike any other." - MetalBite Magazine - 8,9/10. Read full review: bit.ly/fe-metalbite

Featured by Mystification Zine in the list of 10 underground thrash metal albums you missed in 2023: "This one is a brutal downer overall but one of the more ‘modern’ or different takes on thrash I’d heard all year." - 80/100, check the full review on bit.ly/3TEPW1V

Featured by the German zine Metal-Heads in their Top 5 thrash metal albums of 2023 alongside Nervosa, Evile, Angelus Apatrida and Eternal Evil. Read full reviews on bit.ly/48wNv5O and listen to the albums on sptfy.com/tt-23

credits

released June 28, 2023

Recording:
Margus Traumann @ Pergerus stuudio (vocals)
Are Kangus @ Sügis Productions (drums)
Margus Traumann @ Traumanic Productions (guitars, bass)
Kevin Marks & Margus Traumann @ Traumanic Productions (synthesizers)

Choirs:
Kevin Marks
Margus Traumann
Anti Lillak
Priit Mattus
Kalev Lindal
Ülo Annamaa
Ilmar Vatsar

Backing vocals:
Martin Väinmaa
Margus Traumann
Simo Atso
Rainer Parijõgi
Kim Kitsik

Guests:
Ahto-Lembit Lehtmets (vocals on Purity Spiral)
Ivo Laanelind (solo on Xenos)

Synthesizers:
Kevin Marks
Margus Traumann
Simo Atso

Main line-up:
Kevin Marks - guitars, vocals
Martin Väinmaa - guitars
Margus Traumann - bass
Simo Atso - drums

Mixing: Margus Traumann @ Traumanic Productions
Mastering: Minerva Pappi @ Waudio

Special thanks:
Joonas Kisand
Carmel Raudsepp
Laura Lembit
Eve Sõmer
Kim Kitsik
Kaarel-Kaspar Säre
Kristjan Oden
Madis Kaljurand
Sven Varkel

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Tankist Estonia

Estonian extreme metal since 2013. Tankist sculpts their style around old school thrash, often boldly exploring new facets of the genre. After their first raw years, Tankist already redefined themselves by the audaciously eccentric debut LP “Unhuman”. With the sophomore album "Forced Equal" released in 2023, Tankist set off to conquer the darkest corners of blackened thrash akin to avant-garde. ... more

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