black metal

From a murky and somewhat intimidating backdrop of demos, Barathrum presented Hailstorm as their debut album. It is in many ways clearer than the more amateurish demo recordings, but in other ways it is a harsher, more unforgiving beast. Hailstorm is not typical of the black metal style; it is slow, doomy and filled with all sorts of weird atmospheres. Moments of it remind me of Beherit’s Drawing Down The Moon, but this is still…

I’ll be honest with you, when I found out that Phil Anselmo had a black metal band, I thought that it was going to be absolutely fucking terrible. The reality is that Scour’s debut is actually pretty fucking good. Decent production, decent riffs, decent vokills and most importantly, deeeeeeeeeeeeeecent fucking drumming, brah brah. Gold didn’t blow my socks off but it didn’t disappoint either.

Off the strength of the demos you knew that Hell Returns (the debut album from Dutch speedy blackened metal maniax Bad Omen) was gonna be a bangerooni. Production is even better than the two cassette EPs, and I think only two tracks (from memory) reprise here from the demos. All the rest are new original fuckin’ belters. Top playing across the board. The drums in particular sound really great on this one and the vokills…

Shorter and sharper than Returns, Hell is instead a more Venom-esque romp through some goddamn motherfuckin’ fuckin’ metal. Production is still top notch, as is the playing and vokills. Awesome bare-bones metal!

Fuckin’ old school fuckin’ metal from fuckin’ Bad Omens. Heard of these guys from the Headsplit Records newsletter for Jan/Feb 2025 and glad I checked them out. This is a really high quality production demo, more of an EP than a demo. This thrashes hard. It kicks you in the dick with a spiked boot. Tidy!

This split contains material from Ildjarn that’s so polished I had to look up whether or not I was listening to a friggin’ bootleg. Huh. I did a search, and of course, like other Ildjarn shit, it is disputed. So I dunno, is the shit here on this split legit Ildjarn material? Who even fucking knows. It’s good shit, though. Hate Forest stuff here is deep, bassy and still quite majestic despite its heaviness. All…

Murky, weird, off-kilter, moody, doomy black metal here on demo no. 3 from Barathrum. It sounds hideous as all fuck, but that’s pretty cool in my book.

The vibes are a bit “off” with Anciet, if you’ll permit me using Gen-Z speech for a moment. They certainly have their own unique edge, which is special to me considering that they are part of that early 90s Norwegian wave of bands. On Svartalvheim (what a record sleeve, btw), the usual black metal necro shittery is witheld with a servicable production courtesy of Cato Langnes, and accentuated by unusual and sometimes anxious atmospheres permeating…

Your one-stop shop for the Anaal Nathrakh demos in modern times. Contains both Total Farking Necro as well as the self-titled demo for your aural carnage needs, but interestingly also includes the stand-alone bonus demo “Necrogeddon”, which is a super-early version of “Forging Towards The Sunset” from Vanitas (sans chorus). Cool shit! Mayhem cover is great too.

Nasty fucking early demo from Anaal Nathrakh. Pummeling industrial drum sounds are the order of the day, with the blanket of frosty riffs atop them. The now-trademark gargling, howling screeches of Dave Hunt narrate you through the chaos from beginning to end. An aural feast of intense, cold hell. “Lethal, D.I.A.B.O.L.I.C.” and “The Technogoat” are amazing in particular.

Not as good as the other demo that came in the same year but still a solid slice ‘o nasty, harsh, industrial black metal. The sound is overall far more tinnitus-inducing here than on the debut demo. Interestingly, the sample where the words “Anaal Nathrakh” are uttered is re-used here to open this demo just as it was on the last.

Truly, this is a stunning album. In a lot of black metal the synthesizers feel either like an afterthought or just a texture that helps fill out the soundstage. On Hyperborea, Ancestors Blood really take things to new heights with an incredible synthesizer addition. They have always been a part of the sound since the beginning, but here more than ever they help to lead the compositions rather than just compliment them. The production is…

A damn sight better than the previous effort, The Return Of The Northern Moon sees Behemoth actually come into it’s own as a tangible, listenable project. The songs are cohesive, if not quite excellent just yet. There is a large influence from the Norwegian world, but this is probably unavoidable for 1993. Interestingly for all the “black metal safespace” folks, Rob Darken from Graveland plays keyboards on this thing.

People say to me, “Behemoth used to be a proper black metal band back in the day”. It don’t get much more back in the day than this, and this piece of shit demo is 110% death metal, brah brah! Looks like ol’ Nergal and pals came full circle, eh? This demo is pretty terrible, to be honest. I’d only really recommend listening to it if you are like, madly obsessed with Nergal or something….

Feels like a demo compilation more than anything, with sessions ranging in audio quality and also seemingly, musical proficiency. Not a particularly great start to a discography.

Quite possibly one of the best black metal records I’ve ever heard. Lucufigum’s debut full length is a magical mix of synthesizers and non-stop, pummeling metal. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a ton of bands that do that, especially in this genre, and I’m not entirely sure what it is about this record that does it so perfectly. I guess it’s the “vibe” (to get all white girl namaste for a moment), which is second…

A frosted, bejeweled black metal masterclass. Taking the fragility of 90s symphonic black and throwing it head on into a sea of unstoppable blasts and wasp-like guitars, Cirith Gorgor pull absolutely no punches on their debut release. Excellent stuff!

A Naked Whipper comeback / sophomore album was not on my 2025 bingo card, I’ll be honest with you. It’s also very easy to be sceptical of something like this happening, especially so long after the original run, as it were. However, much like David Lynch’s Twin Peaks (bet you didn’t see that comparison coming huh), the Naked Whipper return after several decades does much in the same in that it takes that original perverted…

Another interesting British demo that fits perfectly into the ongoing ASKE label roster. With the production and ethos of black metal, vs the ferocity and attitude of oi and punk, Rampant is both sonically and aesthetically similar to other bands that work with this label (Longbow springs to mind). These four tracks however, are very unique. For those far off the beaten path of both of the aforementioned genres, this comes recommended.

I love that album cover. No doubt that Mysticum walked so a million other bands in this odd crossover style could run, but unfortunately I don’t find In the Streams… all that engaging. The production is great for 1996, and the beats are laser precise. I’m just not really sure if it works with the kind of black metal Mysticum plays on top of those beats. But hey, that’s just me. I do understand why…

Fucking rabid shit from Goatmoon on this one. “Firepower And Steel” in particular is a hell of a track. Really hits the spot. At first, Godless North’s vocals are a bit comical to me, but you get used to them after a little while. Production is a little bit muffled on their side, but the sound is hellish and chaotic enough on this split EP to make me want to find more of their shit,…

First EP from Pagan Hellfire, after several full length records. Real chunky, well-produced black metal with plenty of kick (think mid-career Marduk, GBK, 1349). There’s no thin and brittle frosty sound here! Heavy shit!

Production has an odd hollowness to it but the compositions are dark, evil and sinister as fuck. Equally majestic as it is unsettling – and to top it off, that cover art is absolutely fantastic. Well worth checking out.

Not too dissimilar to part 2, if I’m honest. I’m not really sure why this was rerecorded. I guess there are some subtle differences but all in all, this set of songs is still great either way.

Disappointing. Starts off OK but descends into a mire of boredom and low quality jiggery fuckery. The production across the board lacks any real impact or bite and couple this with the typical compilation rot of “gets worse as it goes on” and you’ve got a recipe for disaster. If I wanted to hear tired, shit-tier cover versions of Mayhem and Bathory songs I’d ring up the guys who I used to rehearse with at…

A mixed bag, but what a bag of goodies it is! It would be realllllly fucking cool if every single track sounded like “Piece By Piece (Remix”) because the drums are fucking out of this world. Proper blast your feckin’ heid off kinda shit. But yeah, idk, what do you want me to say. This shit fucking slaps. Subterranean, dirty-sounding black and/or death from the melting pot that was the Finnish 90s scene.

You can say a lot of things about “raw” black metal but it is hard to argue with the fact that the atmosphere some of these “less is more” projects have is second to none. Vampyric Will is in a similar boat. Does it sound like complete shit? Yes. Do the drums sound like the same beat played over and over and over on a drum machine made out of cardboard? Yes. But, goddamn, the…

A harsh, noisy one from Grausamkeit (who would have thunk it, eh?). What I mean to say I suppose is that this one is lighter on the synth passages and “dungeon synth” kinda stuff (although they do plug away in the background of the songs), and is heavier on the harsh black metal pedal. More gain, please drive! Goat Horns?Goat Horniness?Goat Hornses?

Without wanting to sound absolutely fucking cringe as fuck, there is something incredibly beautiful about this demo. Yeah, Grausamkeit, via Blod Besvimelse very weirdly going viral recently, has become something of a meme, but IMO these releases are timeless. The shaky mix of dungeon synth put to degraded tape and barely audible, truly necro black metal is just perfect. Expectations should be tempered of course as this a cassette demo, not a searing working of…

Very early Darkthrone album that is quite endearing to listen to. It’s really great to hear these guys marry all these styles and influences together. We have vocals that wouldn’t be out of place on a Blasphemy record over the top of melodic riffs that are suspicously close to a certain Metallica track that will remain nameless LOL They were just kids at this point so I won’t be too harsh. It’s a fun listen,…

An incomprehensible blur of overproduced shit, if I could be so bold. Maybe there’s some good songs in here, but through the bricked-out, artificial reverb-drenched walls of sound it’s really hard to pick them out. It’s like if you threw Dissection and Watain into a blender and then squeezed out only the worst parts. The band logo is cool if nowt else.

Far better than the previous AI-cover release that came out earlier this year. Correct me if I’m wrong but I believe a lot of these are old songs written by an ex-member that have been re-imagined for this modern release? Forgive me if that’s incorrect but keeping up with the twists and turns of this band is pretty difficult. Production is fairly homogenous but there are moments of brilliance underneath it. Generally though, Kyffhauserreich is…

Nasty, dark and primitive death metal with cutting streaks of black metal; really, a very interesting blend indeed. Whilst I prefer Never Again (which has a more blunt approach), the mixture of genres here is really fuckin’ great. It’s all over in a flash at 20 mins in length, but it’s well worth your time (you don’t need me to tell you that; this is almost legendary in status these days).

Frenetic, messy, unforgiving blackened thrash in the vein of (perhaps obviously due to the cover song) early Sodom, Sarcofago, early Slayer or Sextrash. Production is pretty fuckin’ good for a demo of this style, but the drumming is very loose which gives the whole thing a ramschackle feel – breakneck speed this may be, but breakneck precision it doth not possess! If you like messy, old school 80s thrash where the genres were really melting…

Triumphant, melodic black metal with the right balance of “kvlt” production; everything sounds raw and natural yet is fully audible and not a task to listen to. It’s only 3 tracks and an outro of sorts, but it’s well worth turning over this rock if you are into the – dare I say – more upbeat forms of black metal. Highlights for me are the first two tracks.

On this split, Venymysgourvleydh provide us with a dense and claustrophobic black metal experience. The drum programming on this session is so relentless that it’s almost quite suffocating; entering the realms of grind or even gabber with it’s hypnotic and over-the-top barrage of percussion. Underneath however is a morose layer of weeping riffs and wraith-like vocals, which is just lovely, to be honest. Collier d’Ombre are not a million miles away from that same sonic…

Okay… so this is a thing that happened. I’m not sure what tectonic series of events occurred that set in motion the stack of dominos that tumbled down into this final result, but here we are. This is now! This is the future! Speaking of which… is… is that a cyborg BlackGoat on the cover? Oof marone! Anyway, this is pretty silly but also a lot of fun. It feels a bit strange hearing Goatmoon…

Fairly clean compared to how I usually like my black metal but this is just my own personal preference rather than a defect; the music on display here is nimble and dexterous and the guitar playing is exciting enough to keep you interested for the whole demo. I wouldn’t go as far to say it’s polished, but the drums have a nice heft to them and the vocals are pretty great too. I’d absolutely give…

Really cool and evocative black metal with excellent synth passages and incredible artwork to boot. The whole package, you could say. For real, this is pretty exciting stuff, and an excellent listen. Highly recommended in my book!

Fogwraith (assuming that they are the first band up) get a bit lost amongst the reeds (or is that within the fog). There’s no clear definition to what they are trying to achieve, but it’s not an unpleasant listening experience. Flagellant are my kind of black metal. Production is natural and raw without being unlistenable lofi garbage, and the drums sound absolutely fantastic. It won’t be the most original thing you’ll hear, but it definitely…

Excellent black metal. Perfect measures of melody and necrotic lofi hell. Matches the horrors of the unknown and the profane darkened secrets of the universe with the more grounded and relatable experience of the simple pleasure of loud music. Entranced together, we must drink of this cup and become ascended. Or something.

Cold, decrepit, miserable, depressing, tepid, deathly, drab, sorrowful. This is what DSBM should sound like, no? Thankfully, early Xasthur helped set the bar for such hideous, menacing music. Nocturnal Poisoning is a journey through a pit of mourning and unfathomable darkness.

It’s almost unbelievable that Dimmu Borgir once sounded like this, if you take the last 25+ years of songwriting into account. This EP possesses a much more “second wave” sound than basically everything else in their discography, including the debut For All Tid.

Wow, what a mess! But truly, such a dark and evil and satanic mess! Shambolic yet endearing in the same way as I suppose Graveland is, minus all of the Viking shit. Drunken, soused, pickled black metal from within the unholy boundaries of Finland.

Exultation Of Cruelty, seemingly coming out of nowhere (although I hardly keep up with the breaking news when it comes to Finnish black metal), takes the crown for black metal in 2024. It is one of the strongest Satanic Warmaster records ever made, which is pretty fucking exciting considering how long this project has been going for now. Comparisons to Judas Iscariot are apt, but a tad reductive. It still sounds like Satanic Warmaster to…

I’ve been spinning this a lot recently. It’s a fairly excellent slice of black metal, and one that surprises me more and more on repeat listens. I don’t have pages of notes about this, but it’s recommended.

One of the better “off the beaten track” offerings in the “magick metal” world. At first, it comes across as yet another murky entry in the style, but as the record unfolds it takes some surprising twists and turns. The guitar playing in particular is of note; with doomy, stoned riffs and ripping, widdly soloing. Despite this, the production is decidedly low key, ensuring that we remain fully entranced by and firmly Under The Spell…

Christ, this is awful. A lot of this “magick metal” stuff is known for being somewhat less than stellar (it’s part of the charm, oddly), but this record is bordering on fucking abysmal. Musically, it’s not so bad, pretty mediocre but the vocals on this record are incredibly bad. They really drag it down to the point where it’s almost unlistenable. A shame.

I enjoyed the group’s split release with Behrosth but on their debut full length they are almost completely falling over themselves. The various styles at play here in this concoction of “magick metal” (or whatever you want to call it) seem to sit apart from each other rather that come together to make a cohesive whole. That’s not to say that the record is bad; there are a few decent songs here, but generally the…

Black metal just the way I like it, fam. Fucking stinking! Yes, MK sounds like he’s drumming on an industrial-sized tub of full fat mayonnaise instead of a snare drum, but if anything this “rustic” approach to drums adds to the janky, raw nature of this uncompromising assault of the sense. 666 (what a title!) verges on the tropes of war metal ever so dangerously, but retains a smattering of icy cold riffs and precise…

A great evolution from the EP which came the year before. It is a shame that this band did not continue past their debut. The cover is a bit half-arsed, but do not let it put you off. The songs from the EP reappear here in a more well-produced form; it is still frosty, and at moments remind me of Dimmu in the Enthrone… era, but this is the keyboard work’s doing. Production wise, idk,…

Came for the art, stayed for the fragile, frosted tunes. I love it when I find black metal from the 90s that I haven’t heard before. Ishtar has a cold, unforgiving atmosphere and a brittle production on Diabolical Hymns, but these three tracks unfold beautifully over a moderate 25 minute run time. Opening track “Morkrets Furste” dominates the EP but closer “Dismal Paradise” has a lot of promise too. Great stuff.

Collection of various demos and misc. tracks from Epäkristus, some are great quality, some are quite raw. It is not the “necro” kinda raw either, but like a rehearsal room kinda raw, like some sort of black metal Agathocles. As almost always with collections like this, the quality is hit and miss. It’s a demo compilation though, so it is to be expected.

Dim, dark, dismal, raw, lo-fi, miserable black metal. Tidy! Not to be confused with the “other” Sort Sind which also plays black metal, this “Sortsind” merges drab, “necro” black metal with tense atmospheric passages and troubling vocal performances to invoke a harrowing and haunting experience. Many thanks to JohnsonBruckheimer on YouTube for the recommendation.

Bosh! Is this reel lyfe? Or is this juste phantasee? I’ve kinda unintentionally managed to avoid the whole “keller synth” movement so I’m massively unfamiliar with the style. All I know is that this sounds like a strange mix between like, 8-bit or video game music, and dungeon synth style keyboard pieces. Oh, and a touch of bad black metal on top! Honestly, this cauldron of a cacophonous creation is actually quite endearing.

It’s hard to shake the disappointment with this one. Beherit returning to their black metal style? Sign me the fuck up! Right? Right!? Unfortunately, Engram not only fails to ignite the spark from the original mystical days of old, but doesn’t really offer anything new in regards to modern black metal either. It fails on both fronts. Throw in a sterile, Watain-ass production, and yeah, this isn’t a winner. Don’t get me wrong, there are…

Great shit. Sounds like Impaled Nazarene (perhaps a bit obviously once you know who’s involved here) but a bit more “straight up” – there’s less nonsense here, let’s just put it that way. Also reminds me of Beherit and Blasphemy in its own way. Great little 7” EP.

Cold Winter Blades is a cool little EP that’s sitting on the boundary of Darken’s fairly savage “solo” Graveland work and the more triumphant and orchestral incarnation that the band would become with Thunderbolts Of The Gods or Hour Of Ragnarok. I don’t know if it’s just me, but the drums here seem absolutely overpowering, but that’s my only criticism really. Otherwise this is solid Graveland stuff.

Incredibly, consistent black metal with a raw and honest production. Song structures are generally long and quite progressive, which is nice to hear when it comes to rawer more rehearsal room feel stuff like this.

Don’t let the shit-tier art put you off; this is a decent listen. Sometimes, things get lost in the reeds in production terms, but from a songwriting perspective this is pretty good. The duelling guitars (not in the Iron Maiden sense haha) keep the songs interesting, as does the interspersed dapplings of keyboard. The vocals and drums are quite “OK”, but nothing to write home about. Worth checking out if you are off the beaten…

On a first listen of this record, I couldn’t get over the “wall of sound” production. The album has however, grown on me. It is a feverish and chaotic, intense and over the top. Only such a wild and in your face production could house such a barrage of different sounds, right? The highlight of most of this record for me is the vocal performances, which range from impressive to completely feral.

Quite possibly the band’s worst album sleeve for their whole discography? Haha! Outside of the one about angel’s bums, the majority of this record blurs together for me. It is, however, a fairly savage attack for latter-era Impaled Nazarene. It has the crisp production, and the same kind of ferocity that Pro Patria Finlandia has. This one seems to go just as hard as that record, in all fairness.

Ooo she’s a very spicy meatball! Impaled Nazarene haven’t exactly come full circle since their original sound, but the break after V&LD seems to have done them a world of good. That previous album blended their 90s and 00s styles nicely, and Eight Headed Serpent serves as a contiuation along that path. This shit is easily, hands down, the best thing they have done since the early 90s. I say that without hyperbole; I say…

UGH what a vigorous and liberating return to form, amirite??? I could just tell from the artwork alone, before pressing play, that I was going to like this one! It shows a correcting course for Impaled Nazarene; not that I believe they have ever put a foot wrong. It’s just disgusting primitive savages such as myself have an unquenchable thirst for caveman material such as earlier Impaled Nazarene, and whilst V&LD is not a step…

I enjoy all eras of Absurd, but the original demos continue to elude my tastes. Honestly, these things are so badly recorded that it because almost impossible to enjoy them. Couple that with the band’s how shall we say, “budding” musical skills, and this is a painful listen.

Manifest is far from a fan favourite but there is very little that this band has done wrong over the several decades that they have been spilling their sleazy, thrashy black metal out into the world. Therefore, Manifest should not be underestimated. In fact, I prefer it to the previous few albums; the production on this is just far more satisfying IMO, even if the songs are perhaps not as great. It’s a strange balance….

All That You Fear is not as good as the albums that proceeded it and started a lull for the next few releases. It’s one of my least favourite Impaled Nazarene records even though in truth I enjoy them all. This one also has the honour of having one of my favourite IN songs, “Armageddon Death Squad” as the second track. Production is nice and balanced too. Things sound great, I’d just prefer other records…

A marked change in the Impaled Nazarene sound happens around this record. There were signs before, with Nihil, in a maturity in the songwriting process. This course continues further with Absence of War… but into a more thrash metal direction. The finished result is then an extra venomous blackened thrash attack, with plenty of blast beats, fast sections and machine gun double bass kicks. Production is a bit crisper, a bit clearer, and it works…

Choppy, messy, yet absolutely satisfying early demo from the wonderfully perverse Impaled Nazarene. Oath Of The Goat, which came the same year as their other demo, Shemhamforash, sees the band experimenting with music that is much closer to their hideous debut album than what we get on that other demo. The death metal is dialled back a bit, and we get the potent mix of grind/crust and black metal (almost like war metal) that Impaled…

Nihil displays a maturity to Impaled Nazarene’s sound that I must admit I did not see coming. The punk / black / war metal blend is still there, but some tracks have a morose melody to them; a more developed and dare I say grown up sound to them. The production isn’t as laser sharp as Rapture, but the balance is still great (the bass sounds fantastic) and the songs hit home as you would…

Rapture, despite it’s unassuming artwork, feels like a return to form and focus. It’s not that previous LP Latex Cult was bad, but it definitely leant to the cheeky, silly, perverted d-beat punk stylings more than the previous records (of which there were only elements, rather than a full theme of). Rapture feels almost uncompromising in comparison, with a fuller production and a much more urgent style of songwriting. I’ll refrain from comparing it to…

Beautiful compositions of meandering riffs and excellent accompaniments in the forms of various keyboard sounds and other traditional instrumentation (whether virtual or otherwise). The easiest comparison I could make would be early Winterfylleth, but the vocals here are much more harrowing, and the guitars are little bit more “evil”, if I could be so trite as to use that as a descriptor. Production is fantastic; clear and vivid, with the drums in particular sounding absolutely…

Lush, infinitely-unfolding atmospheric black metal is the order of the day. This is a project that is highly regarded and it is not difficult to understand why after a listen to De Svarta Riterna. It’s one of those albums where you can just stare at the record sleeve and get lost in the trees as the seemingly endless music unfolds. Good stuff.

Excellently fuzzy yet majestic black metal from Geheimnisvoll. So far, the project has been incredibly consistent with the quality of its releases, and this first demo from 2019 is of no exception. Expect 20 minutes of excellent lo fi black metal. Highly recommended, for what my fucking opinion is worth.

Compiles the 2019 demo and the tracks from the split with Borda’s Rope into one disk. Honestly, as good as this is, you’re better off just hunting down the originals because the split with Borda’s rope is fucking fantastic (including the other band too).

Beautiful split, if I could be so bold as to say so. Geheimnisvoll remind me a little of Satanic Warmaster, but the riffs are a bit more morose and with that trademark “2nd wave repetition”. Vocals are barely decipherable and sound like whispers from a deep and unfathomable tomb or cave. Borda’s Rope are very lo-fi but the guitar work on this thing is second to none. A bit more bare bones all in all…

In a word: confused. Satarial have always been messy, but Blessed Bright lacks the charm which acts as the glue that holds all the disparate parts together. On Blessed Bright, unfortunately that magical charm seems to be in short supply. However, “Horned God”, for how awful it’s lyrics are, is a fun listen, but generally the better tracks are the “Pagan”-heavy instrumental synth/folk/tribal pieces, such as the closing title track.

In isolation, this single is a confused mess of a song. The vocals and guitars are fantastic, everything else is just falling over itself in a competition to be heard.

This shit goes harder than an erect goat penis attached to the mega sado Satan fuck goat incarnation, who has been beamed to earth realm to fuck you, via your stereo of course. Everything is dialled up to 666 out of 10 here.

Solid third album from legendary Finnish “black metal” outfit Impaled Nazarene. It shows more… dare I say, progression than the first two albums, but still retains all of the core ingredients that make IN so fucking entertaining. The production is surprisingly good; the bass sounds fucking incredible and the drumming here is really impressive. A really great album all round.

Heralded as one of the best war metal / grindcore crossovers in existence, and for good reason, I guess. I tell you what though, it’s weird having spent a life time listening to shit like this to just find some random project one day that is praised to all manner of high fuck for doing exactly what a bazillion goregrind/noise/digigrind bands already do, but hey, it doesn’t matter really, Konflikt is fucking great. Proper hard…

What a strange release. Personally, if I’d known it was all covers before I’d pressed play (go me for researching!) I probably wouldn’t have bothered, but sunk cost fallacy and all that… Musically, things are a mixed bag here. The sessions seem all over the place, especially on the Nachtmystium front, but the fact that this is a compilation of different sessions explains all that. The quality of each cover song varies wildly. Oddly, the…

How fantastic is that cover photo? Simple, yet extremely effective. It’s what drew me in. Unfortunately, I found this album, which is in the “atmospheric black metal” vein to be something a little too one-note for me. Production is very polished, all things considered, and I don’t think that helps in this regard. But hey, if you’re massively into the atmospheric side of things, this could be for you.

Stardust contains everything that you could want from a Grausamkeit or BSOD-adjacent project of any kind (well, except maybe the noisecore stuff maybe). Shaky yet endearing “dungeon synth” (it always feels weird referring to stuff that predates this genre name as such) gives way to barely audible black metal lost in a thousand layers of distortion and tape hiss. Audio fidelity you shall not find here, but atmosphere is instead brought to you by the…

Inside you are two wolves… lmao sorry I couldn’t resist. Seriously though, this Aufnorden project is absolutely fantastic. This record is no exception. The Bathory cover(s) in the middle of the album’s run time is a weird inclusion, but in all fairness the song choice blends in rather nicely with what Aufnorden is trying to achieve here. If you take the complexities of acts like the covered act Bathory, or even the scope of the…

Fucking great shit. An epic mix of more “trad” metal styles like thrash / power metal but dosed up with some savage hold overs from the more heathenistic pagan black metal world. Both songs on this thing really surprised me by how great they are. To top it off, the production is pretty solid too. Highly recommended.

Unfolds with much more subtly and nuance than one would expect from a band named Anal Blasphemy. There are some interesting ideas / motifs present throughout the runtime which are varying degrees of experimental but all sufficiently sound evil as fuck. The best track(s?) are the ones with t the female guest vocals – those are genuinely haunting and bordering on terrifying.

Having only previously been familiar with the early Goatpenis demo era I was therefore totally unprepared for the sound of the latter day releases such as Biochemterrorism. This album fuckin’ rules. It’s war metal / bestial black (whatever) and of course comes with all of the carnage that those genres promise, but also has this innate catchiness to the songs that a lot of artists in that world can’t seem to achieve. Production is a…

Messy yet incredibly enjoyable black metal with a rough and ready production. This does genuinely sound like a war machine that’s seen its fair share of battles, grinding on to the next confrontation.

Black metal side project from Mick Kenney of Anaal Nathrakh (which featured his brother on vocals and some other vocalist who I’m not entirely sure about). Good mix of styles. Not too much industrial influence like the more punishing parts of Anaal. Frost has, if you’d forgive me, more cold riffs. I’ve had this 7” for years and I keep forgetting about it.

“Mom, I want a new Graveland CD!” “No, son, we have Graveland at home.” Graveland at home: Undeniably wonky, especially in the drumming department, but if anything this oddly adds to the atmosphere. The production is also fairly terrible. As you can imagine from my opening remarks, Feel the Anger of the Wind (please resist the temptation to make fart jokes) is far from perfect, but those who are inclined to find enjoyment in long…

I’m going for it – I’m gonna give Now, Diabolical a 4. This is probably because of nostalgia reasons, I can clearly see that. Objectively, it is easy to see why long-term fans of the band do not enjoy this one. But, for me, this is where I came in to Satyricon’s world, at least in terms of full-length albums. I remember this coming out, and I saw them on this tour. So I guess…

The fucking samples on this thing lmao – they really lower the tone. Musically, this shit goes hard as fuck. The riffs are sinister as hell. The production is great and the drums sound fantastic. The fills and interesting variations around the blasts send these songs from good to great, but the whacky sampling pulls things back down a little. A strange one. Also, NS as fuck, if that wasn’t obvious.

Really fucking great raw guitar playing and harsh, rabid vocals that had me hooked even if the drum machine had me scratching my head. These drum patterns just do not fit black metal, but after a while, it all started to click into place and I really enjoyed this weird, off-kilter approach. Super cool off the beaten track kinda shit. I am all about it.

Initial reaction was not great, but I sat with this for a while and it really started to grow on me. The mix of acoustic folk and black metal is stranger than it reads on paper. There is something endearing about the tracks, especially the closing title track, which has a really nice vocal melody. Leave your production expectations at the door, however.

It is rather commendable actually how straight-forward and one-dimensional the music of Ildjarn is. Truly, there is a singular focus here that is not present in most other black metal, even that which is precise and calculated. However, precise and calculated are not words that I would use to describe Ildjarn. At first, Ildjarn’s music can appear repetitive and annoying, and I suppose yes, it is rather repetitive and annoying, but there is also a…

Der Tod und die landsknechte (forgive me if I have fucked that up, German is not my strong point) is the project of former Absurd vocalist “Wolf”. On the fact of his inclusion alone, before you get to instrumentation (although that too contributes), it is easy to compare Der Tod… to Absurd, particularly the 2000s era in which Wolf was main vocalist. This album contains the same bouncy yet morose folk-like riffs that Absurd proliferated…

Fucking excellent, super under-rated black metal. Reminds me of a mix of the first Peste Noire record, War 88 and Deathspell Omega, if I could be so bold. The songs on Všehorovnost je porážkou převyšujících managed to be both cold and clinical as well as produced with a warmth and a balance that makes this intense and uncompromising black metal record almost a pleasure to listen to. Highly recommended.

Nordland II continues where Nordland I left off, but my interest is not as high for this one. Perhaps it would have been different in “real time”, with a year or whatever between the two albums, but back-to-back these two feel like one bloated, overly-long record. It is also an unfortunate reality that many of the least interesting songs are placed here on Nordland II. Don’t get me wrong, I need to speak plainly in…

Nordland is something of a return to form after a series of what many perceive to be rather wishy-washy albums. I’ve enjoyed all of the various detours in the Bathory catalog, but have to admit that Destroyer Of Worlds was one of the weakest. It is with great relief then, that it’s follow-up, Nordland, starts off incredibly strong. Unfortunately, the record is somewhat top-heavy, with my interest waning as the record goes on. The first…