"Damnation" is a demo performed entirely by Texas native Rene Vela. As far as 1-man-bands go this is one of the better offerings to come along this way. The style may be described as Melodic Death Metal and by that I'm thinking of Arch Enemy + At The Gates.

The growling vocals (courtesy of the same Mr Vela) have a relatively wide range and the compositions are interesting enough albeit not groundbreaking. Mr Vela utilises a drum machine and while this is not something I'd normally endorse, at least the programming is here done properly.

If I had to cite the demo's defects, I'd say that the mixing is a tad misbalanced and the sound leaning excessively on the treble side. This isn't a major problem though - in fact these songs sound much better than several recordings I've recently heard from more experienced fully-fledged bands.

It appears that the dude behind Strands Of Night intends to devolve instrumentation duties and recruit other band members. Meanwhile this 3-song-very-brief-demo (it lasts under 10 minutes) could be an interesting taster of what's brewing from southern USA. Check them out from the band’s MySpace page.