Antares Predator - Twilight of the Apocalypse’ Battlegod Productions
Culling members from Belphegor, Keep of Kalessin, Harm and Scariot, this slick, tight as a straight mans arse in a homo club, blackened death act hit you with both barrels from the very first track. Razor sharp riffs splatter off your face as this band inject thrashing rage into their full on black-death style. Like Blood Tsunami colliding with At the Gates. Chopping guitar hooks and hacking Sten gun snares gallop alongside the impressive rhythm section that welds the sound into a blustering extreme metal attack. This is such a furiously energetic album you will need to take amphetamines to keep up with it. Technical arrangements weave within this venomously fast environment and the slower sections that allow the songs
to breath a little before the ensuing head spinning velocity kicks in again. With a great armoury of technical skills and able song craft, this debut album just sounds too clinical, too paint by numbers at times
 
Cor Scorpii ‘Monument’ Dark Essence Records
Originally released in 2008 on Descent Productions. This band features members form Windir/ Ulcus and what an album this is. If you ever imagined what a fifth Windir album might sound like then listen to this. Windir is of course the home of the much missed, Terje "Valfar" Bakken [R.I.P], but you would be forgiven for thinking he still breaths his essence. Cited as a Black Folk act and featuring some members of Windir, a piano plays out of a wireless, crackling alone, and from this lacklustre repose barks the classically constructed music of Coir Scorpii. There is a spark of originality lurking amongst the rumbling vocal spite and snapping snares. The track is a hybrid of vicious Blackened intent and imploding
prog rock. The immediacy of the proceedings is second to the intricacy of the arrangements, meaning there is a vastness to the apparent simplicity, a deeper meaning to the very astutely crafted songs. Foremost in this musical myriad of sounds is the raging guitars and vocal chill, both of which are tempered by a symphonic edge that is stitched to, rather than melted into the songs. This creates the uneven soundscape from where this band construct their intricate arrangements. The vocals are very similar to Windir’s charismatic Valfar, with both snarling angst and cleanly sung parts. This debut could easily be viewed as the fifth Windir album [and if viewed as such would fall short of its predecessor in quality] as the rousing blackened music flows in much the same upbeat way. There are the atmospheric keyboards and balanced fusion of aggression and tranquillity. It’s the guitar style that holds the compositions together, creating that unmistakable Windir sound. I have no doubt the band wish to be looked upon as Cor Scorpii, and not an extension of Windir, but that is exactly what they are, like it or not. through the music here.
 
Disiplin ‘Molti Nemici - Molto Onore!’ Frenteuropa Records
Compilation of rare and/or unreleased material:
Vama Marga, lunges out of the speakers like a snapping wolf with a thick guitar sound like modern era Satyricon. The following, Black Sun Rising, has a keyboard spine that evokes the Old Mans Child style of rigorous brooding music and is immersed in a twisted rhythmic post black metal fury. This 2002 material is extremely potent and deeply emotive Norwegian Black Metal. We are then thrown into the 2008 Wolf Age, sessions. Here the bands plummet into a industrial post apocalypse style of cold blackened experimentation. It pure out-take stuff and is neither relevant nor essential listening.
There is a glimpse of 1997 with the one track from that era, Damnation's Cruzade, a rough and raw thrashing deathly track that shows what the band were about before they released any works of note. This compilation ends with some recent material from 2009. Starting with a bizarre eastern sounding industrialized into, the feedback drenched sound hurtles into a terrible fuzz. Fast programmed drums and awkward guitar arrangements drag the familiar Disiplin brutality into a strange uneven and uncomfortable musical vision. The sound is rougher than a warthogs balls and the same can be said for the music. This release is uneven, disjointed and at times pointless unless you are a fan of the obscure or the band. Underground fans will love it, but that’s about it.
 
Dodsengel ‘Mirium Occultum’
The label is so cult it shall not be mentioned [sarcasm indeed] but the band is more important than the label so here we go. Musically this is a far more solid album than the caustic, Visionary album. The trouble with creating such a rib crushing debut like, Visionary [2008] is how to you surpass it? But the music is all that should matter, so it is with a heavy heat I must sate this second offering is a pale shadow of the former. Whereas Visionary was exactly what the title suggested, invigorating twists and head fucks of a pure Black Metal Nordic strain, this more polished and settled album just follows a path set by numerous other acts already. Its still raw and unrefined with hints of Taake and Tsjuder
splintering from its ravenous arrangements. There is depth to the songs and substance to the atmosphere generated by the solid production. Now, that’s where the character of the former album has been lost. That primeval fuzz where the clever musical nightmares emanated from has been replaced with a kind of normality. That is all amiss here and we are subjected t a typically average Black Metal outing. That’s the problem with a band progressing, sometimes it makes no sense, sometimes it works. Here, we have a very good concept lost in a sea of similar bands doing the same old thing.
 
Galar ‘Til Alle Heimsens Endar’ Dark Essence Records
The album title translates into, until the end of all worlds. Galar are a Viking Metal band with strong references to Enslaved, Einherjer, Týr, Borknagar, and Vintersorg. The band employ classical instruments like bassoon, grand piano, double bass, cello, viola, and violin that sporadically appear through the album. The piano plays its role in the musical deployment of Galar. Cold, distant notes pervade the air in the intro that ushers in the mighty, Van. The blast of snares and guitars are surprisingly fast yet cleanly produced. Sharp rasping vocals cut through the atmosphere and lure you into a chaotic realm that is dispelled by the slower up-beat chorus sections. This is Viking Metal with lyrics in
Norwegian and set in a very polished mix. This is a concept album based around the history of the Viking Kings who ruled the bands home county of Vestfold. Stand-out track is, Det graa riket, with its solemn orchestration and mellow acoustic accompaniment. It’s like a film score evoking a long boat on the horizon, listing silently as the crew lay bedraggled after drifting without water for days on end. Overall this is an album of sharp guitar riffs, cleanly mixed percussion and heavy receptacle for the varied instruments already disclosed. There is fluidity to the music here, a lightweight angst that melts into the ears rather than bleeds into them. That said, Galar offer a unique and extremely adventurous take on the genre. Technically accomplished and very well presented. Highlights are probably, Til alle heimsens endar, but mostly the songs sound like the next one until you afford the release numerous plays. That’s the requirement to really absorb the numerous musical layers. When the clean chants kick in Ulver’s, Bergtatt becomes alive, and I suppose that album given a cleaner production and peppered with classical instruments may well be Galar’s best descriptive.
 
Nordavind ‘Bekning’ self released
Viking Black Metal leaning with a traditional Pagan feel. The use of the Norwegian instrument, Hardanger violin [used prominently in the Lord of the Rings Movie trilogy] adds some fantastic atmosphere to the music here. The band hail from a place called, Stord, somewhere in between Stavanger and Bergen, and formed in 2004, released a demo Ukjend Land ‘ in 2006 and now presents us with this pretty harsh yet endearing Viking Metal that has a real Nordic flavour woven into the arrangements. The style is more Einherjer than Windir, and owes more to the hoarfrost glazed Norwegian Viking acts, Arvinger, and, Vanaheim. Strident guitars sit alongside Harsh and clean chants. Then there
is the Hardanger violin (hardingfele), a Norwegian type of violin that elevates the brash atmosphere into a more folk mood during the weaving guitar strums and vocal barks. Here we see a kind of fusion of Skyclad and Windir pushing out the melodic rhythmic notes and reeling them in across the dense Black Metal backdrop. There are glimpse of fine Viking Metal here but the long haul of the album as a whole offers a pretty one dimensional experience and that is down to the bands inexperience. If you enjoy the likes of Myrkgrav, Storm, as well as the aforementioned acts, then this will compel you to adorn an elk skinned cloak and seek the speckled longboats of afar. For a self release the production is a bit thin and yet there is a charm about the bands first effort here. www.myspace.com/nordavindband 
 
Ov Hell ‘The Underworld Regime’ Indie Recordings
Legendary names like King Ov Hell and Dimmu Borgir's, Shagrath do not necessarily make a legendary album.. For those who hope this would be shit, I am afraid it is the total opposite. Here we have an absolute reciting polished Black Metal onslaught imbued with parts Dimmu, parts Gorgoroth and parts Old Mans Child. Mainstream commercial Black Metal can be a mouthful for many purists out there but you just cannot ignore music of this quality. The songs are driven at you with precise power surges and a vocal bite that can chew off the toughest ram hooves. Taking aside the more virulent fast tracks here, the Bathory swamped, Ghosting just oozes that classic Hammerheart atmosphere, whilst the
Dimmu Borgir aligned, Krigsatte Fane, is just melodic Black Metal at its finest. For sure, this is an easy ride, a ball breaking up-beat darkly offering that does little to frighten, but that’s not its purpose. Like all the above ground Black Metal acts from Dimmu to Cradle, the music is watered down high octane enjoyable metal music and for the most of us, enjoying the music is far more important than being miserable. This album is a solid punch in the nose and has some memorable and head cracking tracks to boot.
 
Sulphur ‘Thorns in Existence’ Dark Essence Records
If you're into the more experimental side of Norwegian metal (Arcturus, Virus, etc)
Featuring members from Gorgoroth, Aeternus, Enslaved and Vulture Industries, we are presented here with a modern take on the Black meets Death genre. The first track hits you like a sledge hammer split between snapping snares and slow chunky guitar riffs. The deathly bite of old school bands like Orphanage. The music here has more to do with the brash metallic edge of Gorefest than the experimental extravagance of Arcturus. Thick guitars owe a debt to that Gothenburg bite than the ice clad Black Metal realms this band have evolved from. The fast virulent music is made exceptional tracks like, Into
Nothingness. These are pure addictive guitar arrangements, like a Samael meets Dark Tranquillity in a Gorefest head bashing mosh pit. You will be hitting the replay button for sure.
 
Troll ‘Neo-Satanic Supremacy’ Napalm Records
Troll was formed in 1992 by Nagash [Covenant, Dimmi Borgir] who was 14 years old at the time. I recall getting the Trollstorms Over Nidingjuv, mcd way back in 1995, a veritable caustic symphonic raw black metal statement. 1996 saw the release of the debut album “Drep de Kristne” (“Kill the Christians”). Following the release of “Drep de Kristne”, Nagash dedicated more time to Dimmu Borgir and The Kovenant. The band have since released a few decent albums, the last being, Universal, in 2001. Nine years onwards and here we are with album no-4, and maybe missing the boat by the same time scale. This is a competent enough release of treading water keyboard saturated black metal, brash,
 invigorating and polished to a fine slick presentation. The facts though tell a different story, one of ‘is this the new Old Mans Child’ album?, or a Dimmu Borgir lost recording? There is nothing remotely bad about Troll’s fourth album proper. It is beautifully crafted, fast, hammering symphonic paint by numbers stuff. The band has sadly lost all traces of its smoky Black Metal atmosphere and is now very much [as it has been for years] a mainstream [or as mainstream as this crystal clear sounding stuff can get] band who are ten years too late as this style is already very much monopolized by Dimmu and of a lesser degree Old Mans Child. Like Limbonic Art, Troll will never leap beyond their capabilities, their time has passed and great music will never turn back the clock.
 
Voluspaa ‘Åsa’ Aurora Australis Records
Viking Metal that sound exactly like you perceive it should. This is not the raw Black Metal leaning Viking style of, Stridmen, or Windir. Here we have a more early Enslaved meets Einherjer. Like a magnificent hybrid of Hammerheart era Bathory, Ulvers, Bergtatt, and My Dying Brides, Turn Loose the Swans. This is a potent and invigorating mix of all consuming Viking Metal at its most endearingly hypnotic. Thick guitars and a solid production harnesses a variety of songs that just ooze olden Nordic ….
The choral vocal chants are pure Bathory, whilst the violin evokes the smokey warmth of the great wooden hall of Valhalla. Add to this the wonderfully rich musical primitivism and
vocal bite of Ulver and the uplifting sound of Voluspaa becomes incarnate. There are few bands that can capture the Viking style so perfectly. The violin parts are played by, Hildr Valkyrie (Folkearth), and the female vocals are like Valkyries swooping down upon the battle dead strewn across heaps of shattered mail and splintered blades.