HYADNINGAR The Weak Creation (Total Rust) cd 13.98
Yet ANOTHER amazing slab of extreme, gnarled grim blackness from the seemingly bottomless depths of the French underground, this time from a horde known as Hyadningar. The Weak Creation is the second full length from these evil wicked warriors, and finds the band whipping up serious storm of grim, technical, melodic black metal, a strange mix of Deathspell-ish complexity, epic soaring melodicism, dour depressive miserablism, and even a hint of Viking metal here and there.
That's a lot to cram into one sound, or one record, or even one band, but these guys pull it off, twisting those various sounds into something all their own, and then weaving them all together into some strange blackened patchwork. The first song veers from woozy clean guitars and soaring chantlike vocals, to lurching Burzum-y trudge, to haunting almost martial sounding breakdowns with tangled guitar harmonies, military snares, and haunting spoken word, but it all somehow flows, an expansive, complex bit of black metal chaos.
The vocals are frenzied and frayed, maniacal and feral, slipping from shriek to croak to howl, courtesy of Marquis, whose vokills might sound familiar from his time spent in Bethlehem, Funeralium and Ataraxie, and they perfectly compliment the twists and turns and ever shifting arrangements that make up these convoluted epics. Most of the songs here spend the majority of their time blasting along furiously, the guitars dense and jagged, the drumming impossibly mathy and complex, the melodies mournful and intricate, but the band continually mix things up, whether it's a sudden shift into a soaring melodic crooned breakdown, or a warped bit of folky flutter, or exploding into a totally epic almost psychedelic blast of heart-of-the-sun black majesty.
MPEG Stream: "The Beast Within"
MPEG Stream: "Templars Of The Black Sun"

HYATARI The Light Carriers (Codebreaker / Earache) cd 15.98
Dark, droney, dirgey metal...our favorite! Yep, this new band called Hyattari is an immediate AQ sludge/art metal fave, from West Virgina but sounding like they hail from the deeps of space, giving your ears a cold void embrace in the style of such bands as Skullflower, Halo, and Earth. Hyattari's music consists of uber-heavy sheets of low-end echoing riff-drone on bass and guitar that sound SO GOOD, joined (not even right away, but a little while into the record) by plodding, rigid, militaristic programmed percussion. It's sorta like Growing meets Godflesh! The seven tracks here (with doomy titles like "14,000,000,000 Years Ago", "Collapse", and "Harvesting Sod") pretty much slowly flow unbroken from one to the next, although within a few of the songs you'll find some sudden, short interludes of gentle melody. Haunting and lonely lulls in the sheer HEAVINESS that fills so much of this disc like glacial ice advancing over the globe during the last Ice Age. And it's mostly instrumental, with a small smattering of Neurosisy shouted/screamed vocals, augmented by sampled voices, buried in the massive mix like lost shortwave transmissions or ghostly EVP intercepts.
Besides the abovementioned, a few other artists that this reminds us of include: SUNNO))), Godspeed You Black Emperor!, Isis, Pelican, Cult Of Luna -- and the natural VLF radio recordings of Stephen P. McGreevy, 'cause this disc ends (though it doesn't seem like it ever should end, instead continuing on eternal and infinite like space itself) with a lengthy, mysterious field recording (maybe?) that might just be sferics or other electro-magnetic phenomena from the Earth's atmosphere. Very nice.
Originally self-released, and now wisely picked up by Earache's new avant/extreme Codebreaker imprint (run by the guy who used to do the now defunct Rage of Achilles label), The Light Carriers gets a big AQ recommendation to anyone into this sort of slow n' low majesty.
MPEG Stream: "The Light Carriers"
MPEG Stream: "14,000,000,000 Years Ago"

HYATARI They Will Surface (Caustic Eye) cd 15.98
It's been four years since we first encountered this drone-doom-doom-drone band from West Virginia's debut album The Light Carriers. And its heavy vibrations made such an impression on us, we'd been wondering when we'd heard from them again... of course, for these guys, whose music is sooooo sloooow and seemingly transmitted from the deeps of space, four years probably isn't a long time, not on the grand galactic scale. So we waited, and we're glad they've now at last resurfaced, with, uh, They Will Surface. Considering all the droney, dooooooomy music we sell, having more Hyatari here at AQ is a good thing. Really, it seems these guys should be just as popular as bands like Ufomammut, Atavist, Nadja... certainly if you like the likes of those, you should check out Hyatari!
This new disc picks up where the last one left off, pretty much. A musical 2001: The Space Odyssey monolith of epic, moody, synth sludge DIRGE, built from slabs of Earth/SUNNO)))/Skullflower style distortion and lumbering, crushingly heavy riffs, which seem to explode out of the near-stillness of their more ambient, drifty, spaced-out passages. And it's (mostly? all?) instrumental, so nothing so insignificant and small as a pesky human voice enters into the majestic, black-void-encompassing soundfield. But instead of the Godflesh-y programmed drum beats of the debut, this time around it sounds more like there's a physical being behind the drumkit, pounding away with the pulse of the cosmos. Although, no drummer is credited, so it's probably a machine. Heck, all of Hyatari might just be a machine. We imagine the depressed robot from Hitchhiker's Guide, but serious and scary and for some reason intent on playing ultra-heavy post rockish drone-doom!
MPEG Stream: "Mountain Lit With Fire"
MPEG Stream: "They Will Surface"

HYPNOSIA Extreme Hatred (Hammerheart) cd 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
High-octane, leather-clad thrash metal from a trio of young Swedes who really know what they're doing, old-school style. Everybody in Sweden must play in a metal band, for them to have this many good ones! 35 minutes of pure neck-sprain.

HYPOMANIE A City In Mono (Sun & Moon / Valse Sinistre) cd 13.98
Here's another band for all those folks freaking over the blissed out post black metal jangle pop of groups like Alcest, Amesoeurs, Les Discrets, Sleeping Peonies and all the rest. This Dutch one man band began life as something much more black and grim, but gradually shed all of that as the sound drifted toward something way more shoegazey and poppy.
And that's essentially what this is, a shoegaze record, a fuzzed out dream pop record, albeit one with buzzing brittle guitars, occasional squalls of frenzied fast picking, and once-in-a-while blast beats, and any of the elements that would normally go toward creating a grim black buzz, are transformed into a prismatic psychedelic shimmer, a fuzzy, a blissed out shoegaze buzz equal parts super sunny jangle pop and slow building instrumental crystalline post rock, soaring and epic and emotional, oozing with glistening melodic shimmer, wreathed in warm sonic swirls. If we had to pick one band to compare Hypomanie to, it would probably be Slowdive, a sort of blackened post rock Slowdive, but that same sort of wistful melancholia, and epic shoegazey swells, not to mention the occasional sweeping string like synths. There's also a huge Jesu vibe in the guitar tone and the epic crescendos (which also remind us of M83), and there's a strange looped vibe to many of the tracks, as if the songs were constructed and assembled, which gives the whole thing a dizzying, alien feel, which certainly suits the strange dreamlike sounds. And throughout the record, there are definitely some subtle hints of Hypomanie's black metal roots, in the buzzing guitars, the tremelo picking, the strange production, and here and there, the sound does actually explode into some serious black metal, like the closing bit of the opening track, which bursts into some furious soaring frenzied buzzing, anchored to some double kick driven blast beats, but even then it's all kaleidoscopic and dreamy, the blasting drums buried in the lush sonic swirl, a sound so epic and cinematic and fantastically grandiose. Gorgeous stuff for sure, and ANYone into the post black metal jangle pop usual suspects (mentioned above), will definitely dig this big time.
MPEG Stream: "You Never Gazed At The Clouds"
MPEG Stream: "She Couldn't Find A Flower, But There Was Snow"

HYPOTHERMIA Gratoner (Turannum) lp 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
A brand new three song 12" 50 minute ep from Swedish Black metal outfit Hypothermia, whose black metal, is both strangely not metal, and surprisingly not all that black. Much like German 'wooden metal' horde Varghkogargasmal, Hypothermia spend much of their time playing clean jangly guitar, or offering up meandering post rock jams, minor key guitar strum and simple propulsive drumming, sure there are howled vocals and thick swaths of buzzing blackened riffs now and again, but what is so intriguing about Hypothermia is that they manage to evoke the same sort of suicidal emotions and grim atmosphere, without resorting to typical black metal tropes.
Gratoner is three parts of the same song, side A has parts one and two, while side B has the "Repression" version. Truth be told, all three are quite similar, which in fact plays to Hypothermia's benefit, in that Gratoner plays like one long song, repetitive and cyclical, hypnotic and repetitive, which once drawn in, keeps the listener absolutely ensorcelled.
The core of the track is a loping clean guitar groove, a sort of post rock minor key figure, repeated over and over, alternating between fingerpicked and strummed, the drums too, a simple propulsive midtempo rhythm, all minor key and slightly melancholy, a few minutes into part one, an inhuman shriek surface, and soon after the song switches gears, the same loping jam now overlaid with fuzzy washed out distorted riffage, and the track slips back and forth, clean, distorted, clean, distorted, until part two, where the drums and guitar bliss out, weaving a minimal jangle scape, over which anguished vocals moan and wail, it's a strange combination, but quite compelling, the vocals drop out soon after, and almost the whole second half of the record is just that mesmerizing guitar and drums jam, all jangle and lope, sort of drifty and dreamy and moody, very subtly intense and hypnotic.
The flipside is quite similar, but much more time is spent in black buzz mode, the guitars a thick layer of prickly buzz, over that main riff the anchors all three versions, the track again slipping seamlessly from Burzumy midtempo buzz, to post rock bordering on krautrock groove, the vocals more prevalent, but still that main looping cyclical riff and rhythm keeps us totally enthralled, and could go on forever and ever and we'd keep listening. We're told that these songs may be reworked and added to for a later release, but we actually like them quite a bit how they are, minimal and stripped down, and totally and endlessly mesmerizing.
Pressed on 180 gram vinyl, in an incredibly thick full color gatefold sleeve. The cover and gatefold adorned with gorgeous images of caves and forests, trees, and leaves and lakes, the lp is housed in a printed 12" style inner sleeve (with a hole in the middle), and also contains a small poster of the cover.

HYPOTHERMIA Kaffe & Blod (Turannum) lp 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Kim Carlsson seems to getting soft on us, or at least more melodic. Gone, it seems, are the days of ultra grim buzzing abject suicidal blackness, the sort of sonic filth he spewed in the early days of his group Hypothermia. But we're not complaining, not at all. In fact, even though we've witnessed the sort of consternation this shift has caused in some of our troo black customers, the rest of us are really digging Carlsson's somewhat surprising new trajectory. Most notably in his group Lifelover, who have basically transformed their black metal into a haunting epic doom pop, albeit one rife with demented weirdness (see the review of the new Lifelover elsewhere on this list), but lately more and more in his group Hypothermia, who were never the heaviest band to begin with, but they did buzz and howl with the Burzumic best of them, but record after record, the sound of Hypothermia has grown more and more skeletal, more jangly even, resulting in a shift almost completely away from black metal, and ending up as a sort of lo fi dark jangle post rock, just guitars and drums, the recording very 4track sounding, the guitars mostly clean, very little distortion, the arrangements spare and sprawling, bordering on Krautrock at times.
Carlsson's latest two track chunk of Hypothermic post post black metal comes in the form of Kaffe & Blod (translated to: you guessed it, Coffee And Blood). The title track, takes up a whole side, and for the first half is a loping meandering lazy lope, the guitars spidery and brittle, the drums simple and stripped down, plenty of jangle, the two instruments in a woozy dance, looped into a mesmerizing mantra like progression, that while shifting subtly, manages to entrance in its gorgeous and seemingly unending repetition. The second half does actually offer up some distorted guitar, and just in contrast to the opener it does sound like black metal, but once the track settles in, the sound reveals itself once again to be more of a jangly blackened indie pop, which should definitely hit the spot for folks into Alcest and Amesoeurs and the like. Epic and softly buzz, a little mathy, dark and emotional, but like the first track, no vocals, and a definite hypnotic looped element, ending with a reverby slowcore outro that wouldn't sound out of place on one of our favorite nineties Touch And Go records (Seam anyone?). Really strangely gorgeous.
The flipside, "Dagg" is a 14 minute improvised track, a bit darker, slower, a bit dirgier, the same stripped down lo-fi sound quality, the drums way up in the mix, the guitars clean, but unfurling dark minor key chords, and minimal moody jangle, and even more than the A side, "Dagg" sounds straight out of some nineties mope rock classic. Moody and mournful and meandering, skeletal but still haunting and catchy and mysteriously lovely.
The true black metal hordes might was well give up it seems. As there doesn't seem to be much hope for a return to utter grimness, but in it's own way the music of Hypothermia is still grim and depressive and dark and a bit black, just cloaked in lope and jangle instead of buzz and blast, which suits us just fine.
LIMITED TO 1000 COPIES! Pressed on super thick vinyl with heavy printed inner sleeves and striking black and white jackets.

HYPOTHERMIA Kold (Those Opposed) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
There couldn't be a more appropriate name for this Swedish duo, as it's unlikely you'll ever hear anything colder or frostier. This is harsh and frostbitten, depressive and miserable black metal. Full length number two, after last year's Veins, Kold takes their monochromatic miserablism a step further, two tracks, two riffs, okay, maybe four at the most, one track twenty seven minutes long, the other nineteen, each one a loping midtempo buzz, the drums a relentless plod, the guitar a buzz so blurry and indistinct it almost sounds like a drone, and the vocals, well, you thought they were weird on Veins, they're even more strangled and bizarre here, somewhere between an Orcish death rattle and some sort of beast vomiting up its last meal, sometimes mumbling in a strange mewling grunt, other times a leather lunged glass throated growl, you can almost feel the blood and spittle. But it's the perfect compliment to the music. Hateful, sorrowful, suicidal, depressive, the sound of Kold is just that, so cold and lonely, emotional and intense. About three quarters of the way through the first track, the distorted guitar drops out leaving just a jangly clean guitar, drums and vocals, which is unexpected for sure, but ends up sounding strangely emotionally charged. Soon the vocals drop out too and it's just drums and clean guitar and it almost sounds like some outsider bedroom indie rock, before the buzz kicks back in and the track unwinds in a Burzumic blaze of frosty buzz.
The second track may be even weirder, a blown out buzzy riff, and even doomier rhythmic plod, and the vocals are completely unhinged, falsetto screams, what sounds like that weird breathing-in-backwards singing, growling and grunting and shrieking and wailing hysterically, all over a surprisingly lilting minor key dirge, buzzing and droning, epic yet surprisingly melodic, with another surprise right at the end, a three minute clean-guitar and drum coda, simple garage-y drumming, sort of shuffling and crashing beneath some truly moody jangly strum.
MPEG Stream: "Svag Fysisk Lusta"
MPEG Stream: "Svartade Passager"

HYPOTHERMIA Kold (Turannum) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This long out of print slab of frosty jangly depressive buzz, available again, now on vinyl for the first time, housed in a super fancy full color gatefold, with full color printed inner sleeves and a cool mini-poster, pressed on nice thick 180 gram vinyl too of course!!
There couldn't be a more appropriate name for this Swedish outfit, as it's unlikely you'll ever hear anything colder or frostier. This is harsh and frostbitten, depressive and miserable black metal for sure, predating the group's eventual shift to a sound more jangly and spacious, although within Kold's grimnity, lurk moments that certainly foreshadow that future shift.
Kold is full length number two from Hypothermia, after their Veins debut, and Kold takes Hypothermia's monochromatic miserablism a step further, two tracks, two riffs, okay, maybe four at the most, one track twenty seven minutes long, the other nineteen, each one a loping midtempo buzz, the drums a relentless plod, the guitar a buzz so blurry and indistinct it almost sounds like a drone, and the vocals, well, as anguished and tortured as they were on Veins, they're even more strangled and bizarre here, somewhere between an Orcish death rattle and some sort of beast vomiting up its last meal, sometimes mumbling in a strange mewling grunt, other times a leather lunged glass throated growl, you can almost feel the blood and spittle. But it's the perfect compliment to the music. Hateful, sorrowful, suicidal, depressive, the sound of Kold is just that, so cold and lonely, emotional and intense. About three quarters of the way through the first track, the distorted guitar drops out leaving just a jangly clean guitar, drums and vocals, which is definitely unexpected, but ends up sounding strangely emotionally charged. Soon the vocals drop out too and it's just drums and clean guitar and it almost sounds like some outsider bedroom indie rock, before the buzz kicks back in and the track unwinds in a Burzumic blaze of frosty buzz.
The second track may be even weirder, a blown out buzzy riff, and even doomier rhythmic plod, and the vocals are completely unhinged, falsetto screams, what sounds like that weird breathing-in-backwards singing, growling and grunting and shrieking and wailing hysterically, all over a surprisingly lilting minor key dirge, buzzing and droning, epic yet surprisingly melodic, with another surprise right at the end, a three minute clean-guitar and drum coda, simple garage-y drumming, sort of shuffling and crashing beneath some truly moody jangly strum.
LIMITED TO 1000 COPIES!!
MPEG Stream: "Svag Fysisk Lusta"
MPEG Stream: "Svartade Passager"

HYPOTHERMIA Kold (Antihumanism) cassette 4.50
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
There couldn't be a more appropriate name for this Swedish duo, as it's unlikely you'll ever hear anything colder or frostier. This is harsh and frostbitten, depressive and miserable black metal. Full length number two, after last year's Veins, Kold takes their monochromatic miserablism a step further, two tracks, two riffs, okay, maybe four at the most, one track twenty seven minutes long, the other nineteen, each one a loping midtempo buzz, the drums a relentless plod, the guitar a buzz so blurry and indistinct it almost sounds like a drone, and the vocals, well, you thought they were weird on Veins, they're even more strangled and bizarre here, somewhere between an Orcish death rattle and some sort of beast vomiting up its last meal, sometimes mumbling in a strange mewling grunt, other times a leather lunged glass throated growl, you can almost feel the blood and spittle. But it's the perfect compliment to the music. Hateful, sorrowful, suicidal, depressive, the sound of Kold is just that, so cold and lonely, emotional and intense. About three quarters of the way through the first track, the distorted guitar drops out leaving just a jangly clean guitar, drums and vocals, which is unexpected for sure, but ends up sounding strangely emotionally charged. Soon the vocals drop out too and it's just drums and clean guitar and it almost sounds like some outsider bedroom indie rock, before the buzz kicks back in and the track unwinds in a Burzumic blaze of frosty buzz.
The second track may be even weirder, a blown out buzzy riff, and even doomier rhythmic plod, and the vocals are completely unhinged, falsetto screams, what sounds like that weird breathing-in-backwards singing, growling and grunting and shrieking and wailing hysterically, all over a surprisingly lilting minor key dirge, buzzing and droning, epic yet surprisingly melodic, with another surprise right at the end, a three minute clean-guitar and drum coda, simple garage-y drumming, sort of shuffling and crashing beneath some truly moody jangly strum.
MPEG Stream: "Svag Fysisk Lusta"
MPEG Stream: "Svartade Passager"

HYPOTHERMIA Rakbladsvalsen (Total Holocaust) cd 14.98
Another gloriously grim and frostbitten slab of ultra depressive black metal dirge from these Swedes. Their last two discs were serious AQ faves, their monochromatic blackened plod totally mesmerizing and entrancing. And this one is no different. Rakbladsvalsen begins with an epic 34 minute blast of suicidal black stomp, but like the last few discs, there is a seriously melodic element lurking beneath the buzzing and pounding. In fact, at moments, the melody is almost dreamy, like some jangly indie rock band was possessed by the dark lord, transforming their bright jangle into dark buzz, but never fully letting go of that innate melodic purity.
Mournful and melancholy, the main riff repeated over and over and over and over, the drums shifting occasionally from simple plod to stumbling blast and back again, the vocals harsh and haggard, so pained and anguished, but again, like the music, strangely pretty (in a strangled to death sort of way). The song is relentless, the only real shifts over the 30+ minutes are when the drums drop out, leaving the riff to buzz and hover briefly, until the drums once again kick in and the band lurches back into it's crushing black dirge. Theoretically, even though the disc is separated into 4 tracks, they are parts one through four of the same track, and minus the gaps, they do sort of sound like it, the same (or very similar) key, the same lurching loping tempo, harsh and brittle and buzzing and black, but always subtly jangly.
The final track is the surprise, expanding on what the band had only hinted at before on past releases, a gorgeous post rock jam, simple and minor key, the guitar sound clean, the riff moody and melancholy, the drums a simple math rock groove, the guitar switches lazily between muted minor key melodies, like some June Of 44 or Slint rehearsal recording, two simple parts, both quite lovely, no blown out buzzing blackness, just a dreamy extended instrumental workout, that demonstrates quite well, that slow and moody can be just as powerful and dark as grim and buzzy.
MPEG Stream: "Part III"
MPEG Stream: "Part IV"

HYPOTHERMIA Veins (Insikt) cd 13.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Finally after years of demos and splits and cassette tape releases, the first proper full length from Swedish suicidal black metallers Hypothermia. You might remember Hypothermia from their split with Dimhymn, in the review of which we described their sound as "Epic fuzzed out glacial dirge, with thick riffs spread out in a black smear, the drums a caveman plod, and some of the most fucked vocals ever: weird, something-caught-in-the-throat sort of strangulated grunts and mewls, guttural growls and strange falsetto-y squeaks." And not too much has changed. In fact, Hypothermia's final track on that split was an "epic 16 minute midtempo buzzscape, [with] looped riffs, totally repetitive and hypnotic..." and dang if Veins isn't three of those, each a massive buzzing midtempo black dirge, slowly pounding drums, simple raw hypnotic riffing, repeated and repeated, into a mesmerizing musical mantra, the relentless buzz blurring into near drones, and anguished, cries of utter agony, over swirls of dismal black buzz.
Definitely for fans of Burzum, Nortt, Make A Change... Kill Yourself, Silencer, Xasthur and other purveyors of doomic black hate.
And if the music weren't depressed and dismal enough, the sleeve sports some seriously horrific and blood drenched images, bloody slit wrists, the word failure carved into an arm, a bathtub splattered with blood, and all the lyrics written in blood on blood soaked paper towels...
MPEG Stream: "Isolation"
MPEG Stream: "Failure"

HYPOTHERMIA Veins (Insikt) cassette 4.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Now available on cassette!! A much more appropriately grim and cvlt and frosty format for the first proper full length from Swedish suicidal black metallers Hypothermia. You might remember Hypothermia from their split with Dimhymn, in the review of which we described their sound as "Epic fuzzed out glacial dirge, with thick riffs spread out in a black smear, the drums a caveman plod, and some of the most fucked vocals ever: weird, something-caught-in-the-throat sort of strangulated grunts and mewls, guttural growls and strange falsetto-y squeaks." And not too much has changed. In fact, Hypothermia's final track on that split was an "epic 16 minute midtempo buzzscape, [with] looped riffs, totally repetitive and hypnotic..." and dang if Veins isn't three of those, each a massive buzzing midtempo black dirge, slowly pounding drums, simple raw hypnotic riffing, repeated and repeated, into a mesmerizing musical mantra, the relentless buzz blurring into near drones, and anguished, cries of utter agony, over swirls of dismal black buzz.
Definitely for fans of Burzum, Nortt, Make A Change... Kill Yourself, Silencer, Xasthur and other purveyors of doomic black hate.
And if the music weren't depressed and dismal enough, the sleeve sports some seriously horrific and blood drenched images, bloody slit wrists, the word failure carved into an arm, a bathtub splattered with blood, and all the lyrics written in blood on blood soaked paper towels...
MPEG Stream: "Isolation"
MPEG Stream: "Failure"

HYPOTHERMIA / DURTHANG Lead Yourself To Failure (Northern Sky Productions) cassette 5.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
You might remember Hypothermia from their amazing split with Dimhymn a while back, and we review the killer Durthang tape elsewhere on this list. But these two Swedish purveyors of bleak lifeless doomic black metal are the perfect match up.
Hypothermia's side is an ultra lo fi blast of midtempo buzz, super murky, almost like a practice space recording, with strangled vocals, and some killer riffing. Definitely some serious cult black brutality.
The flipside is two loooong tracks from Durthang, and further convinces us that this could very well be one of our new favorite black metal hordes. A strangely clean sound, but nice fuzzy riffing and way up in the mix drumming. Mournful melodies over relentless double kick drumming. Cool arpeggiated guitar lines over swirling buzzing blackness and blown out distorted vocal shrieks. A darkly depressive Burzumic buzz wrapped around melancholy minor key misery. So good. And so far the only Durthang recording available are on ultra cult cassette tape only!!
LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!

I Between Two Worlds (Nuclear Blast) cd 16.98

MPEG Stream: "The Storm I Ride"
MPEG Stream: "Warriors"

I SHALT BECOME In The Falling Snow (No Colours) cd 16.98
We listed this grim black gem earlier this year, but sold out almost immediately. Finally managed to get handful back in, so don't miss out again...
Yet another archival release from grim suicidal one man black metal outfit I Shalt Become, aka S. Holliman, who hails from Illinois of all grim places, and who, as far as we can tell, has been pretty much inactive for the last decade. This release was recorded way back in 1998 and was originally released as a demo credited to Birkenau, the name Holliman used before fortunately switching to I Shalt Become.
Like Wanderings before it, In The Falling Snow is a fantastic, and fantastically twisted chunk of sorrowful black misery. As doomy as it is black, heavily indebted to Burzum of course, but I Shalt Become shares much in common with other more modern practitioners of this sort of ultra grim, plodding midtempo blackness, Xasthur, Krohm, Nortt, Make A Change Kill Yourself, the riffs buzzing and crumbling, the temps loping and dirgey, the mood grim and dour, super atmospheric, not lo-fi necessarily, but murky and muddy and washed out sounding, dreary and drone-y, sweeping swaths of epic keyboard, and the vocals, an exhausted miserable sounding croak, as if most of the lifeforce has already drained away, not leaving enough vitriol to howl or shriek, just enough energy to barely get out these last words from a moldering old deathbed, the wasted, dead quality of the vocals perfectly matching the depressive mood of the music.
But even as miserable and despondent and depressive as these sounds are, they're also hauntingly and harrowingly beautiful, soaring strings, minor key melodies, super dramatic and ultra personal, everything weirdly soft focus and dreamlike, the buzz and plod blurred into gauzy dronemetal soundscapes, the double kick, a pulse buried beneath thick layers of billowing fuzz, the riffs looped and repeated into black buzzing mantras. Way recommended of course, for the miserable and the black hearted.
MPEG Stream: "Burning"
MPEG Stream: "In The Falling Snow"

I SHALT BECOME In The Falling Snow (No Colours) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
We managed to get FIVE copies on VINYL of this grim depressive classic, direct from the band. WAY out of print. It was crazy limited. These are the only copies we'll ever be able to get, so grab one quick...
Yet another archival release from grim suicidal one man black metal outfit I Shalt Become, aka S. Holliman, who hails from Illinois of all grim places, and who, as far as we can tell, has been pretty much inactive for the last decade. This release was recorded way back in 1998 and was originally released as a demo credited to Birkenau, the name Holliman used before fortunately switching to I Shalt Become.
Like Wanderings before it, In The Falling Snow is a fantastic, and fantastically twisted chunk of sorrowful black misery. As doomy as it is black, heavily indebted to Burzum of course, but I Shalt Become shares much in common with other more modern practitioners of this sort of ultra grim, plodding midtempo blackness, Xasthur, Krohm, Nortt, Make A Change Kill Yourself, the riffs buzzing and crumbling, the temps loping and dirgey, the mood grim and dour, super atmospheric, not lo-fi necessarily, but murky and muddy and washed out sounding, dreary and drone-y, sweeping swaths of epic keyboard, and the vocals, an exhausted miserable sounding croak, as if most of the lifeforce has already drained away, not leaving enough vitriol to howl or shriek, just enough energy to barely get out these last words from a moldering old deathbed, the wasted, dead quality of the vocals perfectly matching the depressive mood of the music.
But even as miserable and despondent and depressive as these sounds are, they're also hauntingly and harrowingly beautiful, soaring strings, minor key melodies, super dramatic and ultra personal, everything weirdly soft focus and dreamlike, the buzz and plod blurred into gauzy dronemetal soundscapes, the double kick, a pulse buried beneath thick layers of billowing fuzz, the riffs looped and repeated into black buzzing mantras. Way recommended of course, for the miserable and the black hearted.
MPEG Stream: "Burning"
MPEG Stream: "In The Falling Snow"

I SHALT BECOME Poison (Moribund Records) cd 15.98
A brand new record from Illinois one man black metal I Shalt Become is always cause for much excitement around here. The aQ metalheads can't get enough of ISB's haunting Burzumic creep, dirgey and doomy and depressive, but as we've mentioned before, ISB takes Burzum's black template and transforms it into something much more lush and washed out and dreamlike, incorporating strings, and swaths of shoegaze-y ambience, we often compare ISB's black metal to very UN black metal soundmakers like Philip Jeck and Tim Hecker, it's got that sort of warm gauzy quality, all blurred and bleary and otherworldly. Which is what we were expecting on Poison, and while that is still present, the sound seems to have shifted dramatically, with the blackness and the buzz taking a backseat, to the orchestration, cellos and violas, symphonies, synthesizers, pizzicato violin melodies, swirling clouds of frenzied cinematic strings, it's kind of shocking, not because classical music and black metal are strange bedfellows, but more because of how the two are mixed here, the result at first is jarring, and as much as we were imaging more of that lush textured murk, this is something way more far out, and fucked up and awesome. It's almost like a black metal score for some Hollywood blockbuster, dramatic and emotional and intense, but those soundtracky elements underpinned by howling metal shrieks, and droning buzzing riffage, that stuff in the background, as opposed to the other way around, it's weird, but seriously cool.
The opening track is all classical fanfare, until the drums come in, and some growled groaned vokills, but they're almost more textural, as horns moan, and the strings soar, it's depressive, but in a wholly different way than we're used to, the drums are matched up with booming tympanis, choral arrangements are rendered in shades of grey and black, there are moments of buzz, but those usually dissipate into something much more atmospheric, letting strings, or orchestral swells drive the tracks, the murky buzzing blackness off in the background, in some ways it's almost more like industrial music, that sort of martial neo classical, MZ412 or Toroidh or Von Thronstahl, Teutonic, epic, majestic, just a bit more metal, but only a bit.
Lots of metalheads will probably be screaming foul, as it was, ISB's sound was already bordering on the avant garde, more minimal and dreamlike, than grim and black, but this has definitely pushed the sound even further afield, but it sounds incredible to us, and just leaves us one question, when is some visionary Hollywood director gonna hit this guy up to score a film??
MPEG Stream: "No Quarter at the Somme"
MPEG Stream: "Harlow's Vertical Chamber Apparatus"
MPEG Stream: "Black Swan Events"

I SHALT BECOME Requiem (Moribund Records) cd 15.98
Newest disc from this long running depressive funereal black metal outfit. Originally formed in 1995, This Midwestern one man band has averaged about one record every four and a half years, although it seems that the band actually spent a good long stretch inactive, since the other two ISB records we reviewed were both recorded before the turn of the century, one under a different monicker.Ê
So, in fact, this is the first full length in almost a decade, and it sounds fantastic, even better than the other two discs, the sound beefed up and much more produced, but without losing any of the sound's miserable grimnity, a record of swirling murky buzzy slow motion doomscapes, distinctly USBM, very reminiscent of Xasthur actually, but ISB is even more blurred and indistinct, most songs having only one or two parts, locked into a mesmerizing looped crawl, the guitars buzzy, but blurred into soft waves of low end, churning and throbbing, everything bathed in a warm gauzy patina, a sea of shimmering keyboards, all very epic and majestic, but so layered and washed out, that it barely sounds metal at times. Instead sounding like some drone drenched super distorted Godspeed, huge crashing waves of sound, everything bleary eyed and smeared into shadows and shapes, even when the metal components drop out, leaving a simple keyboard line to repeat hypnotically or a minor key guitar melody to loop over and over, the sound is more akin to Philip Jeck or Tim Hecker than any sort of black metal, and when the guitars and drums and buzz do return, that doesn't really change. It's still some sort of hazy smoky impressionistic ambient black metal, washing over you like dreamy soft black waves of buzz and whir. Sometimes this feels like the sort of black metal band those guys would actually start. Imagine Tim Hecker, Philip Jeck, Christian Fennesz and William Basinski, all in corpsepaint, lurking in a wintry forest, hunched over their instruments on a dimly lit stage, unfurling these roiling waves of gauzy blackness and looped blur. So intense and hypnotic and beautiful. If you ever wanted to get someone into black metal, this could very well be the record to do it with. WAY recommended.
MPEG Stream: "An Atteridgeville Horror"
MPEG Stream: "Cleansed"
MPEG Stream: "Enigma"

I SHALT BECOME The Pendle Witch Trials (No Colours) cd 16.98
A new disc from one man black metal outfit I Shalt Become is always welcome around these parts. The washed out weary blackened blurscapes are for us, the black metal equivalent of Tim Hecker or Philip Jeck, a sort of black metal Pop Ambience, the various sounds distinctly black metal, but in ISB's strange otherworldly drift, rendered in shades of grey instead of black, the guitars warm whirring smears, the drums murky pulses, the vocals a croak barely audible over the heaving swells of soft buzz. The melodies mournful and miserable, the tempos lugubrious, the vibe grim and forsaken, depressive black metal nirvana for sure.
Sonically, ISB probably has the most in common with Xasthur, but where Xasthur's sound is distinctly lo-fi, almost stumbling at times, the music of ISB manages to be both lo-fi and incredible lush, the sheets of dreamlike buzz spun into lush expanses of warm shimmer, traditional blast and buzz has no place in ISB's windswept sonic wasteland, instead, the buzz is worn smooth, and spread out like gauzy low hanging clouds, there is no blast, only plod and pound, lope and lumber, there are keyboards everywhere, but they are at one with the guitars, adding dense texture, creating soft shadows, occasionally manifesting as super dramatic streaks of sonic melancholia.
The songs tend toward one, maybe two parts, hypnotic and so mesmerizing, almost looped sounding, repeating over and over, totally trancelike, blackly blissful and dismally dreamy.
Near the end of the record, several of the tracks grow fairly aggressive and get about as heavy as any ISB gets, but even then, the sound is infused with the strange choral sounding atmosphere, the instruments wreathed in delay and reverb, everything slowly melting together into one gorgeously bleary and blown slow motion sprawl, culminating in the two chord, storm drenched bliss drone outro.
Some seriously gorgeous depressive black metal for sure, that like past releases, is so blurred and blissy, that it might possibly appeal to folks into stuff like Nadja, Jesu, Fear Falls Burning and other dronedirgedoom outfits as well.
MPEG Stream: "Enstasy (The Theory Of Maxwell's Demon)"
MPEG Stream: "The Serpent Song"
MPEG Stream: "A Ritual Killing"

I SHALT BECOME Wanderings (Moribund) cd 16.98
Originally released in 1996, this slab of suicidal blackness finally gets unearthed and resurrected by the doomed souls at Moribund. I Shalt Become inhabit a completely bleak and barren world of abject misery. A doomy minor key slow motion black metal miserabilism. There's Burzum worship, and then there's taking your Burzum worship to an even more anguished and desolate, wretched and forlorn extreme. Think Xasthur, Burzum, Krohm, Make A Change... Kill Yourself, but then imagine those bands even more despondent, more hopeless, recording with razor blade inches from exposed wrist. A gorgeously bleak and buzzy expanse of minor key arpeggiated guitars, draped like black cloth over thick swirls of monochrome buzz. Riffs are looped and repeated, melodies become murky mantras and the vocals are so distorted and buried in the mix they just sound like whispery squalls of static. So mournful and melancholy. Wanderings is often so slow and fuzzy, so dreamlike that it almost ceases being metal, and becomes some abstract experimental drone music, an ambient soundscape of reverb drenched guitars, a loping black doom waltz, so goddamn sad sounding and so so beautiful.
This reissue tacks on three bonus tracks, not quite as murky and lo-fi but just as tortured and tormented: Two Judas Iscariot covers and of course, an even more morose (is that were even possible?) version of Burzum's "En Ring Til AA Herske".
MPEG Stream: "Fragments"
MPEG Stream: "The Funeral Rain"
MPEG Stream: "Winter Lights"

I TEOREMI s/t (Akarma) cd 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Bombastic '70s progressive rock proto-metal from Italy! I Teoremi were a quartet who really kicked out the jams hard, specializing in muscular, complex stuff that, amazingly enough, at its most extreme reminds us of the prog-punk of much more recent bands like Stinking Lizaveta, Breadwinner, and Ruins! Seriously. For 1972 (when this, their only album, was released), they're one of the heaviest and most spazz-tastic we've heard. Sure, you have to enjoy some grandiose vocals in the typical dramatic Italian prog style, but mostly this is about their instrumental ass-kicking. With its herky-jerky riffing and spiralling guitar patterns, "Il Dialogo d'un Pazzo" could be a song off of one of the first two albums by Greg Ginn's Gone for gosh shakes! This reissue on Arkarma, in one of their mini-lp style digipaks, includes two bonus tracks (which might not date from the same sessions). Everyone into early '70s hard prog and metal needs to hear this.
RealAudio clip: "Passi da Gigante"
RealAudio clip: "Il Dialogo d'un Pazzo"

I.C.E. Apocalyptic End In White (Crash Music) cd 15.98
A few years ago, the UK metal magazine Terrorizer had an April issue that featured what we all imagined was the coolest black metal band EVER: Arktyk! From Alaska, all of their song titles were frosty and chilling tales of blizzard beasts and frozen wastelands. They all had crazy snowy names and the picture accompanying the article of course had the corpsepainted band posed in huge drifts of snow. How could we not become immediately obsessed? Well, we soon discovered that the band was made up and the article was an April Fool's Day joke. But here it is, several years later, and we're tempted to think we're being duped yet again. But the proof is right here in our hands. The new record from I.C.E, aka Imperial Crystalline Entombment. The cover art is a fantasy painting of four figures in white hooded cloaks, and white masks, wielding huge staves of ice, surrounded by icy demons. The band members are named Bleak, Mammoth, Blisserred, and of course, Icesickkill. And the song titles: "Cryogenic Communion", "Astral Frost Invocation", "Hypothermic Possesion", "Apocalyptic Blizzard Regime", "Convulsing Frigid Death" and on and on. Which is all quite appropriate when you finally throw it on and hear the demonic strains of a band bowing in worshipful reverence before Norwegian black metal masters Immortal, circa Blizzard Beasts which, if you're anything like us, is a very good thing. Buzzing, blurry, frosty and ultra grim black metal, with shrieking wails of demonic possesion, thrashing hyperspeed blast beats, and maniacal riffing. Pretty fucking great. And while I.C.E. may be from Maryland, their hearts are firmly packed in blackened Nordic Ice!
MPEG Stream: "Cryogenic Communion / Astral Frost Invocation"
MPEG Stream: "Onward Banshee Legions"

IBEX THRONE Total Inversion (Goatowarex) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Thfe second full-length from Utah's blackened beast known collectively as Ibex Throne. The Zodiac, Lord Dying, Mictlan, Desecrator and Judas Drexor Arawn have reassembled as the blasting buzzing black metal juggernaut that is Ibex Throne. A musical blast of pestilence and pure hatred for all things. An utter loathing for all belief systems as well as a constant striving for the absolute eradication of all humanity. A furious blasting burst of black buzz, with occasional stretches of Xasthur-ish moodiness, minor key chords fingerpicked over sheets of white hot black brutality. For the most part this is blown out blackness, a furious fast fist full of metal, blast beats and guitar buzz, demonic shrieks and screaming feedback all twisted into big metal nails that will seal the coffin that keeps the corpse of humanity below ground. Ibex Throne offers no sympathy, just hateful, blasphemous, nihilistic anti-trend Black hatred Metal!
Amazing cover art, full on high school binder rendering of winged demons eviscerating a naked woman on an upside down cross!
MPEG Stream: "Humanity Is Worthless"
MPEG Stream: "Insidious Wrath"

ICE Code: Quarantine (Carcrashh) cd ep 7.98
Folks who flipped over the recent copies of Techno Animal's Ghosts we dug up and listed a while back, are probably gonna flip over this too, a long lost remix ep from the group Ice, that like Techno Animal, featured both Kevin Martin of The Bug and Justin Broadrick of Godflesh, Jesu and lots and lots of other stuff. There was plenty of overlap between Techno Animal and Ice, both being sort of avant industrial hip hop /dub groups, the big difference was that Ice included sax (played here by both Martin and 16-17's Alex Buess!!), which gave it a sort of free jazz vibe, although that was balanced by Ice's overall lurching, lumbering industrial crunch.
On Code:Quarantine, two tracks from Ice's Under The Skin record get reworked, as does one from that awesome long out of print Isolationism compilations. "Juggernaut Kiss (Deaf, Dumb Blind)" is all nineties industrial thump and skitter, the beats dubbed WAY out, all tangled up in squiggles of distorted guitars, swinging wildly from speaker to speaker, thick low slung bass rumbles and thrums, sax squeals and skronks, the vocals are spoken or mumbled, the whole thing is a constant barrage of dizzying beats, twisted production, and staggering deconstructed beats, like some sort of Godflesh / 16-17 mash up, pulled apart and reassembled as something much more spaced out and skeletal. "The Dredger (Titanic)" is mostly beatless, long stretches of moaning horn and reverbed string buzz, loads of echo and delay, plenty of reverb, streaks of feedback, when the beats to come in, they're pretty abstract, shuffly and skittery, more about texture that rhythm, building to a skronky psychedelic freakout, before locking back into a more stripped down groove, as it slithers through billowing clouds of twisted FX and whirling fragmented melody.
Finally, "Implosion (Flying Machine)" gets WAY dubbed out, thick syrupy basslines under horns and vox and drums, that get slathered in effects and sent spinning, a looped tripped out cracked looking glass bit of free jazz industrial dubbiness, with some seriously killer long stretches of stripped down minimal skitter that makes up almost the whole second half of the song, various beats all space echo-ed and Lee Perry-ed, the motorik rhythm pounding and shuffling its way through occasional fields of crumbling distortion, insectoid buzz, and swirling psychedelic chaos.
WAY OUT OF PRINT. We got a small handful of these direct from the label, who discovered a small stash, so odds are these will be gone before you know it, so buy one now cheap, or pay way too much later for it on eBay...
MPEG Stream: "Juggernaut Kiss (Deaf, Dumb, Blind)"
MPEG Stream: "The Dredger (Titanic)"

ICE BOUND MAJESTY A Tomb To Erect (Frequency Thirteen / Night Angels Serve) cd-r 7.98
We knew we were in for something special when we discovered the amazing Frequency Thirteen cd-r label (thanks to loyal AQ customer Andrew S. for turning us on to these guys). Bands with names like Ice Bound Majesty, Skultroll, Raperack, Black Vomit, Karaoke Vocal Eliminator. Each disc emblazoned with the label's mantra: TRUE SHEFFIELD BLACK PSYCHEDELIA. Which is pretty much the perfect description of this stuff. We might have also offered: grinding corrosive blackened hypnorock, or perhaps blacknoizemetal, or something similar, perhaps blackkrautnoizerock. Whatever you call it, this stuff is dark, and distorted, blown out and heavy as fuck, hypnotic, rhythmic, and seriously genius.
In the case of the geniusly named Ice Bound Majesty we might have to come up with an even more abstract descriptor, something like surreal free folk black metal ambient experimentalism, or epic melodic blackened folk flecked post rock. Actually, like all the best bands, these guys are pretty impossible to describe in a single sentence. The sound is heavy and distorted, blown out and of course black and psychedelic indeed, but IBM are seriously deranged, their songs are like sonic worlds unto themselves, weaving elaborate soundscapes, rhythmic and melodic, with keyboards, and flutes, fluttering flutes, harsh demonic rasps, simple riffing, warm thick black ambience, all woven into an incredibly intense and mind blowing space psych black noise fucked folk kraut rock jam.
The first track is the perfect example. Beginning with some Lustmordian dark ambience, that gives way to folky flute and distant shimmer, which is immediately crushed by a funeral doom plod, the tape speed fucked with so the riffs slow down mid-riff, adding to the tripped out vibe. The flute returns, drifting above the roiling blackness, distant chimes and muted harmonics surface too, then a killer clean guitar riff, and suddenly harsh shrieked vocals, the band sounding like it's about to launch into a frenzied grind, but instead, the sound sprawls out into a looped psych rock jam, with relentless double kick, and those harsh vocals, weird Western whistling, throbbing bass, it could go on forever and we'd be perfectly happy, but suddenly the doooooom returns, even more distorted and in-the-red and crumbling than before. The melancholy melody continues to drift in the background, until the band launches right back into that black kraut jam, this time, everything murky and bass heavy, finally leaving just that clean guitar riff to fade outÉ
How the fuck do you write a song like that, let alone play it? Just writing about it wore us out. The whole record is like that, chaotic, heavy, brutal, black, but strangely beautiful, mysterious and abstract, drifting in a shimmery haze one second, exploding into a black blast the next. Elsewhere the band do some sort of monklike chant over shuffling post rock grandeur, but even then, it quickly gets swallowed up by mechanical monster riffing, and processed evil vocals.
The title track, the 12 minute long "A Tomb To Erect" begins as a bleak, rumbling Wolf Eyes style abject expanse of glittering alien FX and slow slithery rumble, before the drums kick in, WAY distorted and blown out, pounding out a slow motion mathrock rhythm, while in the background, the drones get more and more intense, the track weaves from super hot, high end, to mumbly muddied low end, the drums remaining constant, pounding away relentlessly, until near the end, when a super catchy clean guitar riff joins the fray, and transforms what was sort of an abstract noise rock rhythm jam, into something super intense, emotional and cinematic. The bombastic booming distorted crashes exploding like land mines, spread out along the moody meandering melodic expanse of the songs newly found heart and soul.
Like we said, it's a bit hard to explain what these guys are doing, or even how, but all that means is it's something special, and something we can't stop listening to. Rare is the record as beautiful and mysterious as it is heavy and fucked up.
MPEG Stream: "Book Of Jalends"
MPEG Stream: "A Tomb To Erect"

ICE BOUND MAJESTY How Can We Live In A Kingdom And Never See The Throne (Frequency Thirteen) cd-r 7.98
It's been a good long while since we've heard from the Frequency Thirteen label, home to a sound and style of music we became pretty obsessed with and they call TRUE SHEFFIELD BLACK PSYCHEDELIA. There was Black Vomit, Dukkha, Rape Rack, Skultroll, that amazing Audio Apogee double cd-r compilation featuring a whole mess of TSBP bands, including the above, and then of course there were these guys, Ice Bound Majesty, who at the time we described as surreal free folk black metal ambient experimentalism / epic melodic blackened folk flecked post rock, but then ultimately decided that they were pretty impossible to describe. But now we get another chance with this latest batch of twisted avant heaviness and weirdo blackened psychedelia, which starts out all skittery electro almost, a synth melody draped over a house-y plus and what sounds like animal sounds, only to immediately be obliterated by a wall of SUPER distorted crumbling black buzz, crashing drums and harsh vokills, a sort of blackdrone drift, that also quickly give way to a bit of glitch, and then a long stretch of dreamy, hushed ambient shimmer, all softly layered undulating chordal thrum and delicate acoustic guitars. The second track begins just as baffling, with some sort of sampled Irish folk song, again immediately crumbling in a haze of in-the-red metalgaze buzz, and pounding blown out beats, a sort of electro metallic dirge, that sounds a bit like a more lo-fi version of Necro Deathmort, but it's here where the post rock vibe comes in, the sounds may be harsh and metallic, but the melodies and the arrangements are total Godspeed style slow build drama, loping and hypnotic, although this is IBM, so the song does lurch from that dreamy lope to crumbing blackened metallic dirge and back again, sprawling into a nearly 11 minute second half, where the sound drifts and whirs and shimmers, flecked with sheets of distorted low end, keening feedback, looped feedback, muted skeletal beats, again, sonically in line with the electronic metal hybrid that Necro Deathmort specialize in, but IBM are much more twisted and raw.
The rest of the record is equally schizophrenic, lumbering doomy glitch flecked pound gives way, to swirling druggy, tripped out ambience, which in turn blossoms into a weird sort of electronic krautrock, wreathed in blackened buzz and strange distant voices, before slipping into what might be our favorite track, with looped female vocals, haunting minor key piano melodies, thick doomdronedirge guitars, a super blown out beat heavy second half sprawl, that gradually fractures and begins to stutter, a digital freak out that sounds like malfunctioning cd players, before finishing off with a thick corrosive avalanche of skittery distorto doom.
After a brief bit of haunting industrial ambience, the record finishes with the 12+ minute "Thevirgocluster/Acollapsedstar", which right out of the gate sounds like some Jesu / Nadja hybrid, all big booming distorted beats, blurred crumbling melodies, and sprawling tarpit riffs, all muted and muddied, washed out and woozy, peppered with wide open spaces, the heaviness peeled back to let the drums skitter and shuffle through fields of hushed shimmer, before heaviness swoops back in, finishing off with a wild tangle of collaged vocal samples, and a final hidden track of blurred, softly blackened shimmer. So good.
And here's hoping this heralds the return of the label, and all the warped outfits that sail with her. As always crazy limited, so grab one while you can. And word is there's a new Black Vomit on deck too, so prepare thyself...
MPEG Stream: "Bespoke Negativity"
MPEG Stream: "Sixdaysoulpart1"
MPEG Stream: "Sixdaysoulpart2"

ICED EARTH The Reckoning (Steamhammer) cd 11.98
New single with new singer -- Ripper Owens ex-Judas Priest!

ICON Night Of The Crime (Rock Candy) cd 17.98
Most of the metalheads we know, especially ones with a soft spot for classic eighties metal, are unanimous in their love of Phoenix hard rockers Icon (that is, if they've ever heard of 'em). Their first disc was an all time classic, super rocking, crazy catchy, hooks galore and a raspy vocalist with a voice that sounded quite a bit like Blackie Lawless from W.A.S.P., in fact the whole band was sort of a dead ringer for W.A.S.P., or early Great White even. One of those records we NEVER get tired of listening to. Both Allan and Andee rank it as one of their all time favorites.
Icon's follow up was this disc right here, finally given a super deluxe reissue treatment, by Rock Candy, the UK label that gave us killer reissues from the Sea Hags, Zodiac Mindwarp, the Plasmatics, Billy Squier, and now this, Night Of The Crime.
The liner notes call this "without doubt one of the greatest melodic hard rock records ever made," and while we might not go quite that far, it is pretty awesome. But be warned, it's way more AOR than hard rock a lot of the time, plenty of keyboards, some ballad-y bits. But the songs are all crazy catchy, and the hardest rockers, like "Raise The Hammer" and "The Whites Of Their Eyes" could easily have been outtakes from their first record.
The sound hovers somewhere between Whitesnake, Autograph that sort of poppy hard rocking eighties sound and more commercial fare like John Parr. But it's the hooks and the killer voice that makes this stand out. The songs stick in your head like crazy, and it's difficult to imagine why these guys weren't huge. The liner notes are packed with photos and stories, the band had some serious Behind The Music drama going on, it makes for a good read. But again, if you don't dig the sound of the eighties, poppy melodic radio ready hard rock, big hair, all that, you might not be able to get into this. Allan and Andee both love the first Icon desperately, but only Andee is willing to stand up for this one, but he stands proud, hair teased, spandex pants, bullet belt, Chuck Taylors, lots and lots of scarves, head banging to his heart's content.
MPEG Stream: "Raise The Hammer"
MPEG Stream: "The Whites Of Their Eyes"
MPEG Stream: "Rock My Radio"

IDES OF GEMINI The Disruption Writ (self-released) cassette 5.98
We were lucky enough to get a sneak peak at these new Neurot Recordings signees at the Bay Area premiere for the new Blood, Sweat + Vinyl documentary, all about independent record labels, focused on three of our favorites, Neurot, Hydra Head and Constellation. To commemorate / celebrate, the screening was turned into a show, featuring one band representing each label, Evangelista for Constellation, Oxbow for Hydra Head and this trio Ides Of Gemini for Neurot. Since they didn't have a record out yet, we weren't sure what to expect, other than that metal scribe J Bennett played guitar, and when they took the stage, the shaved headed bushy bearded Bennett sat in a chair, hunched over his guitar, accompanied by two willowy women, both with long dark hair, both wearing what appeared to be white wedding gowns. The effect was striking, even more so when the fog machine came on and wreathed the band in smoke, and the sound was appropriately haunting and witchy, not so much metal as gloomy and ethereal, the drums simple and propulsive, the guitars washed out and warm, and the vocals, lush and layered, hazy and hypnotic, with lush swirling harmonies. The resulting sound reminded us of slowcore indie gloom outfit Warpaint, albeit a bit heavier, the sound being a bit more ritualistic, and the guitar occasionally (and quite suddenly) launching into full on black metal buzz, but instead of the rest of the music following suit, the brief buzzing blast soon dissipated leaving the song to return to its woozy mesmer. This is the kind of dark heaviness (or heavy darkness), that evokes Mazzy Star as much as The Devil's Blood or Blood Ceremony, if not moreso, the tracks here don't blast or pound or thrash, these or haunting funereal ruminations, witchy and otherworldly, hazy fuzz drenched dirges, a gauzy sort of ethereal doom, that is more mesmerizing than it is heavy, a blackened siren song that is utterly hypnotic, especially the last track, the main melody/hook stayed stuck in out head long after that show, and hearing these tracks again, that one especially, has us dying for a proper full length.
The cd is LIMITED TO 333 COPIES, packged in gorgeous metallic blue/silver sleeves, multiple printed panels, super swank, the tape is LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, each one hand numbered, the J-cards on the same sort of metallic paper, and includes a sticker!
MPEG Stream: "Martyrivm Of The Hippolyt"
MPEG Stream: "Slain In Spirit"

IDES OF GEMINI The Disruption Writ (self-released) cd-r 5.98
We were lucky enough to get a sneak peak at these new Neurot Recordings signees at the Bay Area premiere for the new Blood, Sweat + Vinyl documentary, all about independent record labels, focused on three of our favorites, Neurot, Hydra Head and Constellation. To commemorate / celebrate, the screening was turned into a show, featuring one band representing each label, Evangelista for Constellation, Oxbow for Hydra Head and this trio Ides Of Gemini for Neurot. Since they didn't have a record out yet, we weren't sure what to expect, other than that metal scribe J Bennett played guitar, and when they took the stage, the shaved headed bushy bearded Bennett sat in a chair, hunched over his guitar, accompanied by two willowy women, both with long dark hair, both wearing what appeared to be white wedding gowns. The effect was striking, even more so when the fog machine came on and wreathed the band in smoke, and the sound was appropriately haunting and witchy, not so much metal as gloomy and ethereal, the drums simple and propulsive, the guitars washed out and warm, and the vocals, lush and layered, hazy and hypnotic, with lush swirling harmonies. The resulting sound reminded us of slowcore indie gloom outfit Warpaint, albeit a bit heavier, the sound being a bit more ritualistic, and the guitar occasionally (and quite suddenly) launching into full on black metal buzz, but instead of the rest of the music following suit, the brief buzzing blast soon dissipated leaving the song to return to its woozy mesmer. This is the kind of dark heaviness (or heavy darkness), that evokes Mazzy Star as much as The Devil's Blood or Blood Ceremony, if not moreso, the tracks here don't blast or pound or thrash, these or haunting funereal ruminations, witchy and otherworldly, hazy fuzz drenched dirges, a gauzy sort of ethereal doom, that is more mesmerizing than it is heavy, a blackened siren song that is utterly hypnotic, especially the last track, the main melody/hook stayed stuck in out head long after that show, and hearing these tracks again, that one especially, has us dying for a proper full length.
The cd is LIMITED TO 333 COPIES, packged in gorgeous metallic blue/silver sleeves, multiple printed panels, super swank, the tape is LIMITED TO 100 COPIES, each one hand numbered, the J-cards on the same sort of metallic paper, and includes a sticker!
MPEG Stream: "Martyrivm Of The Hippolyt"
MPEG Stream: "Slain In Spirit"

IHSAHN The Adversary (Candlelight) cd 14.98
Latest lashings from erstwhile Emperor imperator Ihsahn. Being the guitarist/vocalist/main songwriter for one of the most important and innovative Norwegian black metal acts ever, anyone with any interest in that scene will be interested to hear what Ihsahn is up to on his own, with The Adversary being his very first solo album.
And as such, remember, it's not an Emperor album... and that's fine, really. In fact, although most frontmen gone solo *don't* do this, the idea behind a solo album should be, well, to do something different than what one does in their main band. But then again, it's more like an Emperor album than a lot of things! However, it's a lot closer to being a Peccatum album (Ihsahn's other prior project with his wife and brother in law). And that's maybe not such a good thing. Tends towards the overwrought. And that's what you've got here, Ihsahn indulging in some overly dramatic, keyboard-theatrical black metal melded with, well, all sorts of things. Maybe a few too many things. It's a trifle too diverse in scope. And while we can hang with the trad heavy metal elements (including, up to a point, Ihsahn's use of his King Diamondesqe falsetto) and the extremities of blackened, mathy prog mania, it's what sounds like cheesy, adult contemporary melodiousness crammed into much of these songs that makes us wince. Enough with the clean vocals, Ihsahn! Still, his undeniably impressive musicianship (he plays everything on here but the drums) and progressive ambitions do result in an album that definitely holds rewards for those into the likes of Opeth, Borknagar, and Hammers Of Misfortune -- even if what Emperor once accomplished without trying, it sometimes sounds like he's trying too hard to do.
MPEG Stream: "Invocation"
MPEG Stream: "Called By Fire"

IHSAN Angl (Candlelight USA) cd 12.98

ILDJARN Forest Poetry (Northern Heritage) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

ILDJARN Ildjarn is Dead (Northern Heritage) 2cd 25.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Ildjarn is a black metal legend. A recently released tribute featured a who's who of the black metal elite paying homage: Leviathan, Xasthur, Forgotten Tomb, Nachtmystium, Urfaust, Azaghal, Grimfaug and more. And rightfully so. Who is more grim, more cult, more legendary than Ildjarn? Having performed as a member of Thou Shalt Suffer and Sort Vokter it wasn't until Ildjarn struck out on his own that he truly discovered his muse, which led him to produce a truly infamous body of work, from super lo-fi black metal buzz to ambient synthesizer suites. This double disc collection compiles the first recorded Ildjarn material from 1992, the mega rare 1993 demo, and the Minnesjord - The Dark Soil demo as well as a bunch of unreleased stuff as well.
The sound of Ildjarn is ultra, ultra, ULTRA lo-fi black metal buzz, with blown out guitars, uncertain drumming, howled demon vocals, with that totally raw practice space recording feel. The really cool thing about Ildjarn Is Dead, is the multiple versions / parts of each song, sometimes as many as 7 or 8 versions, each with varying amounts of fidelity, each it's own sort of lo-fi recording, some muddy and murky, some brittle and high end, resulting in a constantly fluctuating recording quality that is much an instrument as the drums or the guitar. This is the blackest of metal, think Darkthrone, Mayhem, but dig even deeper, closer to the pits of hell, deeper into the black of night, grim and raw and cult as fuck.
There are some brief glimpses of some of the more avant Ildjarn to come later, with some interludes of gristly Earth-like distorted guitar drones complete with record crackle and a strange almost classical / New Age sounding coda, with sweeping synths, and haunting disembodied vocals.
Disc two includes more than 20 minutes of unfinished material 1993-1994, which is completely amazing, some parts are just bass and drums, a skeletal outline of a never realized track, some are fully realized blasts of buzz and hiss, some have strange dropouts and tape warble, giving the whole thing an inadvertently avant sheen, like some strange unearthed decaying tapes a la Basinski (which I guess is sort of what they actually are).
Amazingly packaged and gorgeously printed. An oversized fold out sleeve, printed in black, grey and silver, with a huge insert that features a massive sixteen thousand-word last statement written by Ildjarn, also included are lyrics to all the tracks and the cd sleeves within include the original artwork and more text. Absolutely beautiful. It's released by Northern Heritage, the label that put out the brilliant Crushing The Holy Trinity compilation a while back, packaged in a similarly oversized sleeve, although the design on the Ildjarn is a lot more subtle and visually stunning.
And if you're still not sure if this is essential, how about a few words of warning from Ildjarn himself?
"Before purchasing this product you should take great care in observing the following requirements in relation to it:
After long-term use of this product you may experience increased hatred, thus a lust to kill partcipants of your own breed subsequent to and while operating this product may consequently occur. The copyright owner of this audio product and all its accompanying propaganda declares that it is in compliance with the essential requirements of antilife, and hereby assumes all liability for any injury or death caused by the use of this product. If inexperienced with the kind of hateful and suicidal contents distributed through this product, you should seek the advice of experienced misanthropists and death-worshipers before operation, to assure proper use and to prevent the interference of alien thoughts originating from philanthropists, which will most likely harm the process that may be the result of using this specific product. This product is furthermore solely intended for use in a solitary confinement, and should not be subjected to any other use. Following these rules, this recording and the accompanying words will provide a lifetime of pure frustration, caused by the newly acquired knowledge of the insufficiencies and absurdities of earthly life. If failing in the harsh process of submitting to these rules subsequent to your purchase, users are strongly urged to give away this product to a being willing to obey to the unwritten laws conceived by the sources of death's path, and ultimately the annihilation of the self. Again, be sure to consider all the above requirements prior to your purchase."
MPEG Stream: "Unknown Truths II (2nd Session)"
MPEG Stream: "Unknown Truths III (2nd Session)"
MPEG Stream: "Seven Harmonies Of Unknown Truths XV (Original)"

ILDJARN Nocturnal Visions (Northern Heritage) cd ep 10.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

ILL LITERATURE #17 magazine 3.95
One of the bigger and better 'underground' metal mags in the US. This issue: cover boys Emperor, plus Iron Maiden, Neurosis, Gehenna, Meshuggah, Enslaved, and many others, including even Helix! Pages and pages of reviews too.

ILSA Tutti Il Colori Del Buio (Dark Descent) cd 11.98

MPEG Stream: "Blood Rituals"
MPEG Stream: "120 Days"
MPEG Stream: "Frostthrower"

IMMACULATE Atheist Crusade (Stormspell) cd 11.98
Immaculate? Kind of a strange, and not so tough-sounding, name for a metal band, though not nearly as dubious as some others we've run across (such as Hackneyed, Custard, Argyle, and even Chinchilla, believe 'em or not). Immaculate are from Sweden, so English is not their first language, obviously, but they definitely speak the language of THRASH. And that's why we're listing this. Retro-thrash bands are a dime a dozen these days, and we feel pretty "meh" about most of 'em, but as soon as we gave this a spin, we realized Immaculate were different, and worthy. For one thing, they're got an incredible high-pitched vocalist, and they're clearly inspired by over the top American '80s greats Agent Steel and the even more progressive Fates Warning. So this is "speed metal" as much as it is "thrash", if you know or care about the difference. And, especially on this album's tour de force title track, an 8 minute, 43 second epic, they pull out all the stops, with plenty of chops - it's is like a mix of Iron Maiden with technical thrash metal insanity. All eight tracks are complex compositions of mile-a-minute metal, rife with rapid-twitch riffage, startling shrieks, and some surprisingly melodic moments.
Oh, and they also came up with the song title "Thrashark"! Maybe shoulda used that for the band name... or maybe not.
Impressive stuff, they even do a cover of "The Apparition" by Fates Warning, and it fits right in. Along with sci-fi techies Vektor, whom we should review soon, a big exception to our usual retro-thrash "meh" reaction. This is the real deal, and thus recommended, ragers!!
MPEG Stream: "Thrashark"
MPEG Stream: "Cross Of Nero"
MPEG Stream: "Atheist Crusade"

IMMORTAL All Shall Fall (Nuclear Blast) cd 14.98
RETURN OF THE BLIZZARD BEASTS!
Black Metal legends Immortal emerge after a few years of inactivity, and we are happy to report that the only noticeable difference is that things have gotten bigger and better and FASTER. And while the sound remains relatively unchanged, the strength of Immortal's songwriting and their unbelievable musicianship are enough to ensure All Shall Fall's status as a classic that will sit nicely alongside Pure Holocaust and Blizzard Beasts.
No matter how many black metal albums make their way to aQuarius, certain groups stand out, and Immortal will always be one of those bands we never tire of. Why? Because they're pretty much better than anything and everything else, that's why. While other groups have come and gone, or changed their style drastically with the trends of the day, Immortal continue to remain true to themselves, and with the two years it took to write and record All Shall Fall, you can safely bet that the band has delivered an album that is, in it's own way, absolutely perfect. All the elements of classic Immortal are here: supercharged riffing with a nod to classic metal (and hell, classic ROCK too), rumbling and relentless bass playing, and yes, INSANE, incomprehensibly fast drumming. Of course, none of that would mean shit if the songs weren't great, which they most certainly are. They are 100 percent black metal, but also surprisingly catchy, super melodic but brutal, and fucking EPIC. And like all Immortal records, the songs revolve around the band's self created fantasy realm of Blashyrkh, with lyrics handled by out-of-commission guitarist Demonaz. Go ahead and laugh; while every other black metal band sings their stupid bullshit about Satan, Immortal instead created an appropriate metaphor for the REAL darkness and evil that so many other bands could never truly conceive of.
We could go on about individual songs, but this is the kind of album you will want to listen to front to back. Everything ties together perfectly as you would expect, the production is spot on, and the band sounds amazing as always. Definitely one of the best metal albums of 2009, you could spend some time checking out the sound samples, but do you really need to? It's fucking Immortal.
MPEG Stream: "All Shall Fall"
MPEG Stream: "Hordes Of War"
MPEG Stream: "Arctic Swarm"

IMMORTAL All Shall Fall (Nuclear Blast) lp 38.00
RETURN OF THE BLIZZARD BEASTS!
Black Metal legends Immortal emerge after a few years of inactivity, and we are happy to report that the only noticeable difference is that things have gotten bigger and better and FASTER. And while the sound remains relatively unchanged, the strength of Immortal's songwriting and their unbelievable musicianship are enough to ensure All Shall Fall's status as a classic that will sit nicely alongside Pure Holocaust and Blizzard Beasts.
No matter how many black metal albums make their way to aQuarius, certain groups stand out, and Immortal will always be one of those bands we never tire of. Why? Because they're pretty much better than anything and everything else, that's why. While other groups have come and gone, or changed their style drastically with the trends of the day, Immortal continue to remain true to themselves, and with the two years it took to write and record All Shall Fall, you can safely bet that the band has delivered an album that is, in it's own way, absolutely perfect. All the elements of classic Immortal are here: supercharged riffing with a nod to classic metal (and hell, classic ROCK too), rumbling and relentless bass playing, and yes, INSANE, incomprehensibly fast drumming. Of course, none of that would mean shit if the songs weren't great, which they most certainly are. They are 100 percent black metal, but also surprisingly catchy, super melodic but brutal, and fucking EPIC. And like all Immortal records, the songs revolve around the band's self created fantasy realm of Blashyrkh, with lyrics handled by out-of-commission guitarist Demonaz. Go ahead and laugh; while every other black metal band sings their stupid bullshit about Satan, Immortal instead created an appropriate metaphor for the REAL darkness and evil that so many other bands could never truly conceive of.
We could go on about individual songs, but this is the kind of album you will want to listen to front to back. Everything ties together perfectly as you would expect, the production is spot on, and the band sounds amazing as always. Definitely one of the best metal albums of 2009, you could spend some time checking out the sound samples, but do you really need to? It's fucking Immortal.
MPEG Stream: "All Shall Fall"
MPEG Stream: "Hordes Of War"
MPEG Stream: "Arctic Swarm"

IMMORTAL At The Heart Of The Winter (Osmose) cd 13.98
The return of Immortal!!! These frosty warriors may have hung up their spiked gauntlets, but their legacy still looms large. Easily one of our favorite black metal hordes EVER, these records have been frustratingly tough to keep in stock over the years. Thankfully, they've all been reissued, in all their frostbitten black blurred glory!
At The Heart Of Winter is from way back in 1999, but is one of the later albums by these blizzard beasts. You might be disappointed by the lack of blurred blast beats and blazing Arctic riffs but you certainly won't be disappointed with the results of these corpsepainted Norwegians' last photo shoot! A newfound obsession with pro wrestling and a new, very large and perpetually shirtless drummer (sporting a black metal belly girdle!) make this cd great to look at, but it's actually a great listen as well. As mentioned, gone is the speed of their previous effort Blizzard Beasts --in it's place is a stripped-down, more midtempo, straight-ahead heavy metal sound. Better, more professional production than in the past, plus catchier riffs combined with stumbling, propulsive drumming make this a record that Andee and Allan both love (while big Immortal fan Josh from The Champs votes this as the *worst* metal album of the year--go figure).
Note: in the years since this album came out (1999) ol' Josh has had a change of heart and now admits that it's a pretty good record! And Allan rates it as his favorite Immortal opus ever. Andee places it at number two, right behind the classic Blizzard Beasts!
MPEG Stream: "Withstand The Fall Of Time"
MPEG Stream: "Tragedies Blows At Horizon"

IMMORTAL At The Heart Of Winter (Osmose) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Now available on vinyl for a limited time! Along with almost all the other albums in the Immortal discography -- we're missing only Battles In The North ('cause the shipment to our supplier arrived damaged) and Sons Of Northern Darkness ('cause it wasn't released by Osmose). Like the rest, this At The Heart Of Winter vinyl edition comes packaged in a gorgeous gatefold sleeve, with new photos and design. Here's what we had to say about the cd back when it came out:
You might be disappointed by the lack of blurred blast beats and blazing Arctic riffs but you certainly won't be disappointed with the results of these corpsepainted Norwegians' last photo shoot! A newfound obsession with pro wrestling and a new, very large and perpetually shirtless drummer (sporting a black metal belly girdle!) make this cd great to look at, but it's actually a great listen as well. As mentioned, gone is the speed of their last effort Blizzard Beasts --in it's place is a stripped-down, more midtempo, straight-ahead heavy metal sound. Better, more professional production than in the past, plus catchier riffs combined with stumbling, propulsive drumming make this a record that Andee and Allan both love (while big Immortal fan Josh from The Champs and Weakling votes this as the *worst* metal album of the year--go figure).
Note: in the years since this album came out (1999) ol' Josh has had a change of heart and now admits that it's a pretty good record! And Allan rates it his favorite Immortal opus ever.

IMMORTAL Battles In The North (Osmose) cd 13.98
The final installment in the recent long overdue campaign of Immortal reissues (the rest of which we reviewed a few lists back).
The return of Immortal!!! These frosty warriors may have hung up their spiked gauntlets, but their legacy still looms large. Easily one of our favorite black metal hordes EVER, these records have been frustratingly tough to keep in stock over the years. Thankfully, they've all been reissued, in all their frostbitten black blurred glory!
As we've said before, you just can't go wrong with Immortal. It's like a big cold hug. For grim black metalheads that is! Everyone has their favorite Immortal. The raw early records, the slow more melodic later releases... and while we definitely love both, our hearts were originally captured by the brief two album black blizzard of buzz that was Blizzard Beasts (1997) and this here slab of frosty grimness Battles In The North. Originally released in 1995, BITN was the record that found Immortal finally unleashing their inner frost giant, from the album art, images of the band members crouching in the snow in full corpse paint with their instruments, to the much more explicit themes of winter and frost and blizzards and ice and snow, to the much frostier sound, a black metal white out, flurries of impossibly fast drumming, blinding swirls of buzzing riffage, the raspy winterdemon like vocals, Battles In The North is fastfastfast, a buzzy blinding blur, brief moments of folky guitar or droney ambience surface here and there, but for the most part this is a black metal avalanche, a huge white wall of black sound. Blizzard Beasts would up the fast and frosty ante a couple years later, but Battles In The North remains a pure and primal explosion of gloriously ultragrim Northern darkness!
MPEG Stream: "Battles In The North"
MPEG Stream: "Throned By Blackstorms"
MPEG Stream: "Grim And Frostbitten Kingdoms"

IMMORTAL Battles In The North (Osmose) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Now available on vinyl for a limited time! Packaged in a gorgeous gatefold sleeve, with new photos and design.

IMMORTAL Blizzard Beasts (Osmose) cd 13.98
The return of Immortal!!! These frosty warriors may have hung up their spiked gauntlets, but their legacy still looms large. Easily one of our favorite black metal hordes EVER, these records have been frustratingly tough to keep in stock over the years. Thankfully, they've all been reissued, in all their frostbitten black blurred glory!
This is absolutely the best Immortal record (sez Andee!) and easily one of the most important and most essential black metal releases ever. Released in 1997, Blizzard Beasts find Immortal hovering between the total grim primitive chaos of their earlier records and the sharp tight black metal majesty of their later releases, which kind of makes sense when you realize this is their final record as Blizzard Beasts, after this they would proceed to slow down, write longer songs, massive midtempo epics filled with classic metal riffing as well as more traditional metal song structures. It's almost as if they knew this was their last hurrah, so they went all out, made the tempos faster, the arrangements more complex, the guitars that much more buzzy and blown out, the vocals as inhuman as humanly possible, without losing their uncanny knack for hiding hooks amidst all that black buzz, or their distinctly classic Norwegian sound. The ultimate blast of forsty, wintery black metal, a furiously frigid barrage, an amazingly trance-inducing, complex blur of drums, rasping howls and icicle guitars, stopping and starting but at never less than 100mph! So totally amazing. Up there for sure with Burzum's Filosefem and Darkthrone's Transylvanian Hunger as far as absolutely essential black metal is concerned.
MPEG Stream: "Blizzard Beast"
MPEG Stream: "Nebular Ravens Winter"
MPEG Stream: "Frostdemonstorm"

IMMORTAL Blizzard Beasts (Osmose) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Now available on vinyl for a limited time! Packaged in a gorgeous gatefold sleeve, with new photos and design. Here's what we had to say about the cd (not a lot, but believe us, it's quite possibly our very favorite Immortal record): Highly-regarded Black Metal band (weirdly enough, Steve Albini's favorite) unleash their latest frigid barrage, an amazingly trance-inducing, complex blur of drums, rasping howls and icicle guitars, stopping and starting but at never less than 100mph. Their best album yet (as of 1997) and certainly their most Morbid Angel.

IMMORTAL Damned In Black (Osmose) cd 13.98
The return of Immortal!!! These frosty warriors may have hung up their spiked gauntlets, but their legacy still looms large. Easily one of our favorite black metal hordes EVER, these records have been frustratingly tough to keep in stock over the years. Thankfully, they've all been reissued, in all their frostbitten black blurred glory!
Damned In Black was originally released in 2000, and was the second to last release before the band called it quits. Immortal, by the time Damned In Black was released, were THE elder black metal statesmen, true members of the Norwegian black metal elite, Abbath (not as in "please take..."!) on guitars and Popeye vox, big ol' drummer Horgh, and new guy Iscariah on bass, (with the sidelined Demonaz still writing lyrics) return after their groundbreaking "At The Heart of Winter", the disc that slowed down (a bit) the previously way FAAASSSTTT tempos characteristic of their speedy-demon classics "Battles In The North" and "Blizzard Beasts" and added more melody, more trad metal riffing, and mo' better production courtesy of Peter Tagtgren & his Abyss studio. "Damned In Black" follows the "Winter" blueprint, being kind of like a "At The Heart of Winter Part II" but without the amusing wanna-be WWF wrestler band photos that garnered so much attention/ridicule last time around. And while the title might suggest some sort of Satanic theme, the Immortal boys stick with their personal mythology of a frosty Northern dimension full of ice, wind, and cold. Immortal fans everywhere (even the ones here in San Francisco who got dissed by the band when they didn't show up to play and went to Mexico instead) should put on some mittens and enjoy this evil icecapade. AGAIN!
MPEG Stream: "Triumph"
MPEG Stream: "Damned In Black"

IMMORTAL Damned In Black (Osmose) lp 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Now available on vinyl for a limited time! Packaged in a gorgeous gatefold sleeve, with new photos and design. Here's what we had to say about the cd:
The new Immortal has arrived. True members of the Norwegian black metal elite, Abbath (not as in "please take..."!) on guitars and Popeye vox, big ol' drummer Horgh, and new guy Iscariah on bass, (with the sidelined Demonaz still writing lyrics) come back atcha a year after their groundbreaking At The Heart of Winter, the disc that slowed down (a bit) the previously way FAAASSSTTT tempos characteristic of their speedy-demon classics Battles In The North and Blizzard Beasts and added more melody, more trad metal riffing, and mo' better production courtesy of Peter Tagtgren & his Abyss studio. Damned In Black follows the Winter blueprint, being kind of like a At The Heart of Winter Part II but without the amusing wanna-be WWF wrestler band photos that garnered so much attention/ridicule last time around. And while the title might suggest some sort of Satanic theme, the Immortal boys stick with their personal mythology of a frosty Northern dimension full of ice, wind, and cold. Immortal fans everywhere (even the ones here in San Francisco who got dissed by the band when they didn't show up to play and went to Mexico instead) should put on some mittens and enjoy this evil icecapade.

IMMORTAL Damned In Black (boxed version) (Osmose Productions) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Remember back on list #90 when we first got "Damned In Black" in, and we said that someday we'd be seeing some sort of 'boxed' import version but didn't know if it would be worth the wait and the bucks. Well here it is. Seeing as it doesn't cost much more, maybe it is worth it if these guys are your favorite frostdemons. You get the jewelcase version of the album (digipaks are all gone now anyway) snugly concealed inside a handsome cardboard box with artwork (a hellish cover painting) not to be found elsewhere. Otherwise, it's the same, no extra tracks or other goodies or anything. In case you missed the description before, here's a condensed version: True members of the Norwegian black metal elite, Immortal come back atcha a year after their groundbreaking "At The Heart of Winter", the disc that slowed down (a bit) the previously way FAAASSSTTT tempos characteristic of their speedy-demon classics "Battles In The North" and "Blizzard Beasts" and added more melody, more trad metal riffing, and mo' better production courtesy of Peter Tagtgren & his Abyss studio. "Damned In Black" follows the "Winter" blueprint. And while the title might suggest some sort of Satanic theme, the Immortal boys stick with their personal mythology of a frosty Northern dimension full of ice, wind, and cold. Immortal fans everywhere should put on some mittens and enjoy this evil icecapade.