Black Majesty ‘Baphe Metis’ Demo Tape
This demo cassette arrive ominously in the post, archaic in presentation and in sound I soon discovered. The unusual thing about this particular demo is the symphonic leanings to the songs, a rare style to replicate nowadays. There is a very personal, singular style to the compositions, all crafted by one, His Black Majesty. The basic raw guitars/desolate vocals and muffled production is familiar enough to form the basis of an average Black Metal demo, and yet the addition of keyboards harkens back to the mid-late nineties when bands like Manes, Odium, Obtained Enslavement and Limbonic Art, created their symphonic Black Metal demo awakenings. With great variation in pace, switching from fast sections to an almost dragging macabre atmosphere, this demo manages to keep you interested for the six track duration. The vocals descend into deathly grunts on occasions, and the music incorporates many eerie keyboard scores. There is a haunting deathly pallor hanging over the sound, setting this demo above many of the sub-standard nonsense I receive. A Norwegian Black metal demo that sounds like it was recorded many moons ago, thus retaining a certain menace to its malevolent musical moods. I have no contact for this band, seek it out if you can wherever you can.
DHG ‘Supervillain Outcast’ Moonfog Records
	The abbreviated Dodheimsgard moniker fits well with the bands evolution from classic Black Metal act to experimental industrial infected modern dark metal. Here we discover an album that seems to take its body from the invigorating, 666 International opus of 1999, and rather than explore further into the weird unknown, the music has a strange regressive feel to its vitriolic bite. There is a potent modern feel to the sound, a stringent industrial back bone that lifts the sound out of the stereotypical Black Metal framework and plants it firmly in the twisted wreckage of the music’s own self mutilating atmosphere.
There is no logical frequencies to the songs, and only the collaborating vocal styles of harsh and clean do we sense other Nordic acts Solefald and Arcturus, creeping into the brooding atmospheres. The bulk of the material tilts back and forth, from lulling industrial smog, to invigorating, dare I say it, nu metal guitar styles. There is an eerie subliminal meaning to the traversing melodies, from where the ghosts that haunt the mechanics of the songs drift between the ears, discharging an unnerving atmosphere. To actually listen to something that is totally unique lends itself to the strangest of experiences. To not be able to follow the structure of a song and pretty much be unaware where the corners are going to appear, gives this album a more potent body of musical uncertainty. This is definitely an album of disconcerting sounds, unique compositions that will taunt and serenade you within its dark and light tones.
Goatchrist/ Embrace of Thorns ‘In Embracing of the Goat’/ split CD Black Plague 666 Productions
	This split CD features the Norwegian band Goatchrist, and the Greek band Embrace of Thorns. Goatchrist is a one man aural head shredding machine [also creator of the Norwegian act, Unholy Crucifix], both bands being well and truly anchored to that raw as an open wound, gut fucking Black metal style. To say that Goatchrist play an unearthly din would be an understatement. This band makes Darkthrone sound lame, such is the distorted guitar sound and grossly fuzzed out vocals. Its like listening to an Autopsy demo played through a bass cad reverberating with feedback. The music is more like a grind fest with the worst
Japanese Noise mongers you can imagine. So when you get 5 distorted bass heavy Black Metal tracks and 2 electronica intros, you may as well cut your wrists and be done with it. [not for the faint hearted or vegans] How do you follow that?, in brief, Greek act Embrace of Thorns, fail to match the sheer intensity and harrowing vocal attack, but music wise, there is a sickening low fi, gurgling headfuck simmering within the tracks, spitting a similar bile splattered Death/Grind meets Black Metal in a bucket of piss. I must stress, this is a split cd containing 2 vile demos with a basic sound and utterly horrid music. A must for Christ rapists and megalomaniacs everywhere. For the rest of us, maybe its beyond the frequencies of bad taste.
Krypt ‘I Am God’ EP, Agonia Records
	From the ashes of the wonderful Tsjuder, arises the first signs of life after death, with vocalist/guitarist Nagg, and drummer Desecrator [both formerly Tsjuder] So with this two track EP, we have the first signs of what will follow in album form later in the year. This is basically a Tsjuder meets Gorgoroth in a pot of Zyklon B. Standard Norwegian Black Metal expanding on the minimalisms of the genres basic structure and adding depth with melody and diversity. The fast/slow arrangement style. Hellish roaring vocals and almost hardcore like guitar strum, creates a very interesting sound and one that gathers momentum as the tracks spiral into purgatory. There is a sense of urgency to the galloping drum-work
and frantic fretwork, again evoking the more compact Black Metal styles of Tsjuder and Gorgoroth. Not music to set the world ablaze, not bad either.
Mare ‘Unholy Black Sorcery’ demo tape / 2006
	Once you’ve got used to the stifled sound [don’t demos just get you down sometimes?], there is a rather interesting set of tracks that lift this band above the average. I felt a chill down my spine as past memories of listening to the Emperor demo entered my head. Even that demo sounded like shit, and yet there was a wonderful majesty to the material. Here, the songs are driven in a similar vein, with a dry guitar strum leading the muffled drums in its wake. Rasping vocals spit their rage across this dread atmosphere, with the music set to a mostly mid tempo pace. Keyboards make brief appearances to lift the darkly compositions into a more ‘Emperor’ like mood. The band pics are so reflective of the Gorgoroth/Emperor/Satyricon images of the mid nineties. This is true Norwegian Black Metal with melody and variation, and one of the few bands that I would liken to the aforementioned bands early material. With a decent production, I would suspect this band will make a good impression on the scene.
Nephilim ‘The Tome of Shemhazai’ demo.
After a 2 minute intro that nearly sent me into a deep sleep, I became roused with the burst of Burzum like thrashing Black Metal. Ghastly, shrilling vocals and a standard tinny sound, that afforded me with little respite to the following aural tumult. The songs are controlled with varied levels of intensity being released when the mood demands. With 4 tracks plus a intro/outro, the music is never instantly digestible, a few airings is the required dose to enable the full grimness of the compositions to make themselves known. Whilst the material is intricate, there is a simplicity to the sound that sets the mood firmly in a blackened rage, a tormented and sorrowful sound always prevailing over any attempts at evoking warmth through melody. Scowling vocals reeking of demo era Mayhem, and the music also alludes to a more primitive Black Metal style. Maybe its the ‘heard it all before’ syndrome that makes this demo pretty harmless. Nephilim@myspace.com
Sworn ‘The Alleviation’ Twilight
	Tagged as Norwegian Black Metal, but harnessing a sound more in tune with the Swedish melodic death metal sound of the nineties. The sharp, cutting guitar sound of bands like In Flames, Nocturnal Winds and Gandalf, come to mind when listening to the snappy flurry of six string riffs that batter the ears in a ceaseless surge of Blackened Death Metal. Again, Dissection do have their mark etched over the music, as this style is very much in debt to the Swedish legends. The band features Lars Jensen, of the blackened folk metal band Myrkgrav, so this is a more technical style than his mother band. I have played this numerous times without feeling anything special is happening, and that’s is
more than likely down to the musical formula being so mainstream in texture and content. The musicianship is precise and decisive, the songs polished and crisp, and this is the albums main flaws. The sound is too smooth, the presentation too clean, and that creates that all to familiar style that evokes the already mentioned acts, as well as mid-era Sentenced, and Dark Tranquillity. As for having any relations to Norwegian Black Metal, hardly any moments provoke such connections, but the music is made of stern stuff, strong, melodic and easy listening Heavy Metal on amphetamines
Unbeing ‘Unbeing Black Draped In Unlife’ Fossbrenna Production. demo tape.
Featuring, Udeth [also of Istorn/Grenjar], on Bass/Guitar and Steingrim, vocals/drums. Here we have a dreamy, lazy guitar strum that drifts along a plodding path of melodic gloom, one long, twilight illuminated track that unwinds its brooding atmospheres like an open wound feeding upon the cold breeze for its raw flesh to harden. Like Strid, or the more current Selvhat, this is a slow burning and wonderful Black Metal dirge. The Varg like squealing vocal delivery, sends shudders down the spine, and this repeating combination of ear screeching vocals and resonant guitar drones creates a stunning singular piece of music that airs another of the many sides to Black Metal. This is a demo to close your eyes too and let the hypnotic rhythms take you to another place far from the shit of life where anything is possible and all things are clear. The dreamy mood generated by the guitar arrangements is one of a sustained ongoing strumming technique, seemingly never ending, ceaselessly gnawing at the air with mist veiled rhythms and gentle melodic repose. For escapism, this style of pure mind numbing Black Metal is untouchable.
Unholy Crucifix ‘Black Mass Sacrifice’ demo tape
A side project of the utterly ear ripping Goatchrist, and it seems the unearthly din of that most ruthless of acts, is reborn here. The distortion injected vocal delivery, fuzzed out guitars and battering snare attack is a collision of extreme sounds that clash and rage in a cauldron of acidic atmospheres and dire cacophony. This is just a noisy gallop to Hell with no real depth to the music, no real substance of longevity. There is no real separating the textures of Unholy Crucifix of its mother band, Goatchrist. Both set out to spit blood and piss on the face of God. Extremity can be measured by its potency and without any recollection of the latter, the former is nullified.