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Los 4 Jinetes del Apocalipsis is a raw and exceptionally heavy recording from the earliest years of Spain’s underground hard-rock and metal scene. Originally recorded in 1978, it captures Zarpa Rock before the group shortened its name to Zarpa and developed the more polished heavy-metal style heard on its later albums.
The group formed in Mislata, Valencia, during 1977 when its members were only fifteen and sixteen years old. Initially called Wolframio, the teenage musicians spent their first year learning their instruments and rehearsing before adopting the name Zarpa Rock.
After joining the Zeus Rock management agency, the band was offered the opportunity to make its first professional recording. Because the available studio budget was extremely limited, the complete conceptual album was performed live in the studio during a single extended session, with the musicians playing together rather than recording their parts separately.
The resulting sound is primitive, distorted and unusually aggressive. Vicente Feijóo’s guitar dominates the music with thick fuzz, wah-wah effects and long, uncontrolled solos, supported by Eduardo Feijóo’s heavy bass, Javier Hervías’ rhythm and lead guitar and Jesús Martínez’s forceful drumming.
The five compositions form a dark concept centred on the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. War, environmental destruction, famine and the collapse of civilisation are explored through dramatic Spanish-language vocals, ominous echo effects and extended instrumental sections.
The title track establishes the album’s apocalyptic atmosphere with slow, Sabbath-like riffs and wild guitar breaks. “La Contaminación” and “Llega la Destrucción” increase the pace while retaining the rough psychedelic production, before the longer “La Guerra Cruel” and “El Hambre” move into darker proto-doom territory.
Although recorded at the end of the 1970s, the album has more in common with the raw heavy psychedelia of the early part of the decade than with the streamlined heavy metal that was beginning to emerge. Its overloaded guitar sound recalls Black Sabbath, Sir Lord Baltimore, early Judas Priest and the heaviest Spanish groups of the period.
The recordings were originally distributed in extremely limited cassette form and became one of the great obscurities of Spanish hard rock. This Sommor edition marked their first appearance on vinyl, presenting the complete album remastered from the original tapes and housed in a heavy sleeve with archival notes and photographs.
Track listing:
Side A
1. Los 4 Jinetes del Apocalipsis – 5:16
2. La Contaminación – 5:55
3. Llega la Destrucción – 6:42
Side B
1. La Guerra Cruel – 8:21
2. El Hambre – 8:57
