Behemoth - The Apostasy
Regain Records
Blackened Death Metal
11 songs (39:52)
Release year: 2007
Behemoth, Regain Records
Reviewed by Dylan
During the drive to my nearest BestBuy, I realized that I would walk away a moist fool with the shortage of gasoline in my tank and the excess of sweat on my body if I didn’t come back with what I was searching for. Strangely, I didn’t see The Apostasy sitting there, waiting for me in Behemoth’s slot on the rack. In fact I didn’t see any trace of Behemoth anywhere in the store. Panic flooded my mind. After clearing my thoughts of the swirls of disappointment it had been flooded with, I managed to get my hands on a copy of one of the most anticipated death metal releases of the summer, thanks in no small part to a metal-friendly employee who understood my dilemma and managed to find a copy lying around somewhere in the back room. So, in the few minutes between my acquisition of the physical disc and it’s first rotation in my CD player, I was pondering a number of questions in my head. Is this as traumatically heavy as Demi-God? Do the songs flow well? Have they returned to their black metal roots? Is this quality metal? The respective answers are: More or less, sorta, …ha, and yes.

This record contains a number of firsts for Nergal & friends. Most notably, Inner Sanctum features the extremely cool combination of an eerie piano, mixed with the godly vocals of Nevermore’s Warrel Dane, juxtaposed against the ever-methodical death metal onslaught of Nergal’s riffs and vocals. Other additions include a trumpet trio, and a small choir. These new elements are used quite sparingly and never come close to overpowering the core sound, though they do manage add an epic touch when they are used. As expected, the production on this beast is very clear, though I feel that Orion’s bass didn’t get the boost I had hoped it would. Nergal is still very adamant about his beliefs of inner strength, self-worship, and quite opposed to many facets of Christianity. The liner notes have Nergal’s inspiration and explanation behind the song’s lyrical themes, and a cool collection of symbols, pictures, and quotes sure to enrage your local priest.

If you were to put The Apostasy in a musical centrifuge, you would see that it is composed of the same elements that Behemoth has been using since Satanica. Extremely technical and intricate drumwork team up with riffs that shift between low-end thrashy madness and melodic riffs that revolve around the Lydian scale, giving the songs somewhat of an “Arabic” feel. Fans of Nile should also be familiar with this type of sound. Nergal still sounds like a beast, but not like a HUGE fucking beast like he did (with the help of some studio magic) on Demi-god. So in many ways, not much has changed since 2004. However, I noticed a strange thing after my first few listens. The album finishes much stronger than it begins, which is quite a rare occurrence in the world of extreme metal. In fact, things didn’t really pick up until the crushing At The Left Hand ov God, which begins with energetic acoustic guitars, and then turns into a four minute headbanging feast. Kriegphilosiphie is a straight up blaster, and contains some trumpets buried under the furious riffs. Be Without Fear could be considered the album’s most accessible song, beginning with a triplet-laden, dare I say…”bouncy” riff. Haiving said that, there is no track that stood out in the way that Conquer All and Slaves Shall Serve managed to do on the last album, and it seems like it suffers from a slight case of sameness on tracks like Prometherion, Pazuzu, and Arcane Hereticae. Still, when you have songs like Inner Sanctum and the anthemic Christgrinding Avenue, it makes up for the slight overdose of repetition.

Overall, I was quite pleased with this new output from Poland’s biggest band. Sure, it could have been a bit more original in parts, and could have had some stronger songs placed at the beginning, but if you are patient enough, you will be rewarded with some killer tracks tucked away in the second half of the album. This is more of a grower than Behemoth’s last two works, and seems to have more of a collective “album” feel, whereas Demi-god seemed like a collection of anthem after anthem for nearly 40 minutes. It may not be the band’s best work, but it is another proud addition to their captivating and beastly discography.
Killing Songs :
At The Left Hand ov God, Kriegphilosiphie, Be Without Fear, Inner Sanctum, and Christgrinding Avenue.
Dylan quoted 81 / 100
Other albums by Behemoth that we have reviewed:
Behemoth - I Loved You at Your Darkest reviewed by Goat and quoted 75 / 100
Behemoth - The Satanist reviewed by Jared and quoted 70 / 100
Behemoth - ...From The Pagan Vastlands reviewed by Goat and quoted no quote
Behemoth - Satanica reviewed by Khelek and quoted 92 / 100
Behemoth - Evangelion reviewed by James and quoted 92 / 100
To see all 10 reviews click here
13 readers voted
Average:
 84
Your quote was: 92.
Change your vote

There are 18 replies to this review. Last one on Thu Aug 23, 2007 1:55 am
View and Post comments