Over the last couple of years I have reviewed a number of Hammer of Hate releases. If one wants to get a feel for Finnish underground black metal, then this is the label to go to. Just last week it was Pure Evil, and today the turn is for the labelmaster himself, Molestor Kadotus, and one of his solo projects Anal Blasphemy. Now here is one band whose albums and covers I would not quite want to share with my children. Not yet, anyway. But if at school or anywhere else they are being pressured by some pious Christians evangelizing to them about the purity and love of Christ, they can bring Anal Blasphemy’s Perversions of Satan as ammunition to prove that Satan can have love too. Only Satan’s is not quite pure, but more deviant and filthy in nature. Hell, Satan doesn’t even know what gender he/she is. Just look at the cover depicting this horny and horned half goat-half hermaphrodite to take a guess yourself on who Satan really is.

Just like male, female and animal are interwoven in Anal Blasphemy’s depiction of Satan, the album mixes the matters of death and black metal, both primal and melodic. Just as the overall picture tends to be barbaric and crude, the subtle melodicism of guitar progressions on the title track, Perverse Madonna Filthy Magdalene and the close Altar of Indulgence elevate these tracks above others. If anything Altar of Indulgence eventually steers away from the nasty side of things, to grow glum and introspective. The drumming, provided on the album by Kryth (Pure Evil), is far from incessant blasting, but rather measured and almost airy background onto which Molestor Kadotus lays his for-the-jugular riffs. The voice with which he delivers these blasphemies is also not an expected shrill shriek, but rather commanding death metal bark (Black Cum Absolution). And in the spirit of total gender confusion Possessed Demoness (from another Hammer of Hate act Anguished I had an opportunity to cover earlier) lets it completely loose when allowed to howl on Lust for Satan (Sexual Worship). Sexual worship, indeed, it is, both howls and more measured cleaner vocals reeking of animalistic orgasm.

If I only had one word to describe Perversions of Satan I would call the album an orgy. If I had two, then this orgy would get an epithet of abnormal. Where one is expecting to be a dominating partner, he may become a subject of a lustful and vicious attack all of a sudden. The hunted, on the opposite, becomes the hunter and soaks what used to be his/her predator with love fluid. To aid in the atmosphere of worship, which always ends up being a sexual debauchery on Perversions of Satan, Molestor Kadotus very cleverly uses the samples, many of them in Finnish, or some other language unknown to me. Could be an invented language of Hell, Sodom and Gomorrah for all I know. As much as the overall picture sounds chaotic, Anal Blasphemy is surprisingly cleverly produced, so that Perversions of Satan never becomes a lineless noise.

To be kept away from moral superfreaks, or maybe used on purpose to challenge them, Perversions of Satan is certainly an underground album, not entirely suitable for mainstream listeners, even if black metal is one of your preferred genres.