I have to plead complete ignorance on Satan’s Host. I never heard of the band before. I never knew the band played power metal in its first incarnation in the late 80s. I never knew Harry “The Tyrant” Conklin (better known for his long-standing run with Jag Panzer) made a brief appearance with Satan’s Host in those days. I did not know the band pulled out a phoenix, by resurrecting itself early this decade, while making a total commitment to a more extreme metal style. Yet one complete run through their latest Power “Purity” Perfection … 999 and I know now that evil never used to sound so epic.

Whatever the style, Satan’s Host are dedicated to bringing into perfect harmony their Dark Lord loving aesthetic, pointed lyrics and penetrating occult feeling. They can savage you with riffs (Sitra – Ahra (Power9)), hack off chunks of flesh in stop’n’go End All – Be All … 2012, deafen with death metal thunder (the Mardukian closer Xem Deitus …999) or open up with the gallop any power metaller would be proud of (Dark Priest “Lord Ahriman”). Anything they do, they continue to build and build their songs up, those immense lengthy epic song structures never collapsing under the weight of their multiple elaborate directions.

This is perhaps best seen on Luciferian Spirit (Perfection 9) and Satanic Magick “Evil Divine”. Just when I thought that both songs would unfold with the slower rocking mid-pace impactful Gorgorothian tempo, Satan’s Host proceeded to defy my expectation and build them into towering monsters with crushing blasts, crunchy, not feeble or fuzzy, tremolo and leads spilled all over the place. Guitars are on a separate plane in Satan’s Host. All of them, including bass, are handled by Patrick Evil and manage to be intricate to the point rarely heard in the extreme side of metal. It is obvious the man is the master of his craft, not to be compromised by fierceness or intensity of the subject matter. He lurks with grotesque riffing underneath the blasts in End All – Be All … 2012, layers on endlessly at the end of Azael 9 Lords – 9 Keys … Abyss-King, sounds like a thousand trumpets in 333 (Purity 9) or is a pure slithering cobra in my favorite lead of the album on the opener Sitra – Ahra (Power 9).

The record would be incomplete without the other potent cornerstone of Satan’s Host – vocalist LCF Eli Elixir. If you can believe it, the man manages to sing in a growling voice. “We are the Warriors of Satan” is backed up when this guy is saying it. Hissing snake is his brother, LCF Eli Elixir’s voice in Satan’s Host completes their evil impersonation.

Captivating listen throughout, Satan’s Host deliver on two fronts. They practice what they preach and they show that evil and Satanic should not equivocate with primitive. For being true to themselves and doing it so intricately, the band should be lauded alone.