Another four years, another Latin title, and we have another Dark Funeral album. From the realm of “what you expect is what you get” the blasphemous Swedes have shown one more time how to produce powerfully sounding professionally executed Norsecore.

To describe Dark Funeral on Angelus Exuro pro Eternus as intense is an underestimation. The band, which lives and dies by the blasting and wall-of-sound, continues in the same vein with Nils Fjellstrom (Dominator) replacing Matte Modin in the battery position. Lord Ahriman (guitars) is always saying that Dark Funeral does not plan to blast your eardrums to smithereens, and it is just the natural flow of how things happen, but the effort to open Angelus Exuro pro Eternus with The End of Human Race and The Birth of the Vampiir, back to back explosive outbursts, had to be premeditated. Speaking from experience, it is actually fun to dig into Dark Funeral riffs to uncover squeezed in melody line (title track), even though at times the fabric of their songs begins to blend together from all the blasting.

Trying to differentiate from themselves, Dark Funeral drops in some interesting nuggets at a rate of about one-per-song on this album. The grinding guitar on My Funeral gives way to a triumphant line played over a simpler, but effective, drum pattern. War drumming of Demons of Five winds its way to a culmination of an interesting solo adding its voice into a choir of demons which is Emperor Magus Caligula vocals on this album. On some cuts Dark Funeral sounds extremely ominous (The Birth of the Vampiir), displaying a certain symphonic flair for the dramatic. If anything, Angelus Exuro pro Eternus is rather thoughtfully crafted to maintain interest and seek multiple run-throughs to actually figure out what focused your attention in one particular track vs. the other. It looks like whatever formula Dark Funeral have been perfecting for years, this album is almost that recipe's finest hour. (There is no help here for those who have been rejecting Dark Funeral direction outright.)

The two almost counterintuitive slower tracks on the album happen to be its finest moments. Even though on Stigmata the slowdown does not last long, the penetrating chorus, slaying melody and hammer-on-the-anvil drum rolls rock the foundation. In My Dreams is another breather crusher where Caligula reaches back for extra and guitars just plain slice akin the latest Gorgoroth album. After this track an otherwise fine My Latex Queen sounds almost anti-climactic, if not for its tom smacking outro.

In its effort to portray how Black Mass should really sound Dark Funeral push the drums to dwell in the bottom. Bass and tom dominate the drum sound, while cymbals are hardly heard and distorted guitars, which are now doubled, take up all higher frequencies. Appropriate vocals and relentless aural assault, every time I listen to Dark Funeral (especially on the last few albums) I found their Demons to be those strictly for show. The stuff of movies and books, you can get immersed into the dark side with Angelus Exuro pro Eternus, but even less than subconsciously you realize that Dark Funeral is putting on a performance, albeit a good one, and this stuff is not borne inside some sick perturbed soul. For as long as it is OK with you as a black metal fan, that the evil will depart into thin air the minute the music stops, Angelus Exuro pro Eternus provides for a glimpse of good quality artificial darkness.