Metal Reviews

Half way through


Monarchical DM supremacy.

A warm-sounding production, accommodated by crisp guitar-work, a foundational bass-work, that is never absent from the overarching sound, and the coverage by the vocalist, making this release a well-rounded, straightforward DM recording, with no silhouettes.

Initial impressions. Certainly not what I was expecting from all the over-salivating reviews on the Archives.

Much more immediately likeable than the previous album.

Swedish DM to this day has an immediately recognizable sound, both in the fashion in which it was produced, it was played, and it was constructed. The early seeds of Therion's sound, is distinguishable, from the remainder lot of Swedish DM, from the experienced listener, but most certainly, recognizable, from non-European bands, for certain. This release is restrained in the utility of melody, but never short in broodiness, and in the sheer weight of the riffage and the hammering of battery.

The cosmological imagery of the art work is reflected in the music and the colour scheme used is truly effused and life-like. I do think that music, that is, the riffing, particularly the speed of the guitar-playing, and the violent vocal-work, are very much at the extreme ends of intensity, and so because of this, my guess, is that, Daemon does not see it fit to apply real drums to his music. The music has a stormy, vortex-like nature, akin to the art work, itself, filled with cosmological violence and whatever else it is that is capturing Daemon's imagination. A man well into to his fifties and still interested in the fantastical and the imaginary. I'd say, good for him, if he can still afford to cultivate that kind of mindset, which is evidently the case.

A short-lived French-Canadian act of rare musical capabilities that never made music passed the early 2000's.

A melodically dramatic and a highly theatrical affair from the French black metallers.