The new Immortal album: just the title itself gives a clue of what to expect; “darkness” to which the Norwegian band seem to have a patent of. Of course Immortal can easily be entitled as one of the leading (Norwegian) Black Metal bands, and in that respect this release seems to more important than just a new Immortal release.
The popularity of Black Metal seems to be on its way down the last few months. A respected band like Mayhem has completely changed its sound, and bands like Dimmu Borgir and Cradle of Filth have become more mainstream than Black (the price of getting popular?). Looking on it this way, you can say that also Immortal has went through some (cosmetically) changes; a different logo on their last 4 albums and a clear and powerful production, which is not always regarded as being true Black Metal.
There seem to be no surprises. Like all their other releases, the band itself is on the front cover, en lyrically the band remains wandering around in their beloved dark Norwegian woods, although they do take a holiday trip to Antarctica. If you would play all releases of Immortal chronologically, ‘Sons of Northern Darkness’ would fit in perfectly. Do not expect a dark sound like on their first two albums (‘Diabolical Fullmoon Mysticism’ & ‘Pure Holocaust’), no merciless fury as on their legendary ‘Battles in the North’ and its successor ‘Blizzard Beasts’, but, like their last releases, a pure and wonderful mix of Black Metal and Heavy Metal, and that is something you can always cheer me up with. They will loose perhaps a few fans from the beginning, where as they may gain some new fans. Having said all this (no surprises) don’t think that this album is disappointing, because it has turned into a great album!
The album takes off furiously with ‘One by One’, and right away some strong aspects of this album are shown; a clear and well produced (full) sound, with great (sounding and played) drums, a lot of beautiful breaks and above all the characteristic voice of Abbath, sounding like a raven from his beloved Blashyrkh. The title track starts and ends furiously as well, although the center of the song takes the pace down into the more powerful parts of Immortal’s sound, which is, by the way, also a characteristic feature of Immortal. After two faster songs (hyper speed is nowhere achieved by Immortal) comes the epic slow headbanger ‘Tyrants’. The opening of the song looks like a slow adaptation of ‘Withstand the Fall of Time’ (‘At the Heart of Winter’), but after that it turns into a great slow headbanging song. And also the typical acoustical Immortal breaks show up in this one.
After that follows the ferocious song ‘Demonium’, and the album is closed by ‘Within The Dark Mind’, ‘In My Kingdom Cold’, ‘Antarctica’ and ‘Beyond The North Waves’, four typical Immortal power songs. Special remarks are to be made about the wonderful drums & guitar riff in ‘Within The Dark Mind’, the powerfull riff of ‘In My Kingdom Cold’ (and the fact that this songs seems to end at a certain point, but then revives again), the epic ‘Antarctica’ which sounds in the beginning as if it is an instrume(n)tal and the appearance of keyboards in the ending song. Curious by the way that the two last songs on the album start with an intro.
Two critical remarks; one is that Immortal/Abbath will never show up with thundering/astonishing guitar solos (although, no one cares in the case of Slayer, so why change traditions) and the fact that Iscariah can hardly be heard at the bass; well, this may mean that the bass parts are close to the guitar parts, which ensures that there will be no huge gaps live performing this great songs. So don’t take this criticism too strong.
Final conclusion: 50 minutes of delicious, typical Immortal music to be advised to all who like Immortal and to people who into Black Metal, just not that much into extremes. Hail to the kings of the raven realm!
Nuclear Blast
- Country: Germany
- Style: Black Metal, Death Metal, Doom Metal, Thrash Metal, Other
- Links: Homepage, Facebook, Instagram, Bandcamp, Youtube
