As the right honourable and esteemed master of ceremonies Fenriz points out on the bonus ‘directors commentary’ disc of this release, German magazine Rock Hard on its original release in 1996 warned people to stay away from this as it was for die hard fans only. He adds that the album was recorded with tape recorders at rehearsal. This was the way things were done at the time and one could say it was ugly raw music for ugly raw people. Of course the album itself was originally laid down and completed in demo form in 1991 and was meant to be the follow up to Soulside Journey, continuing the “complex and technical death metal” side of things. Of course history shows that the band had second thoughts and this never saw the light of day at the time as darkness well and truly was descend with ‘A Blaze In The Northern Sky.’ In fact it was not until 1994 that Fenriz added vocals to this and it was first issued on Moonfog in 1996. The first half of the bonus disc is an illuminating listen for those of you who really want to immerse yourself into the potted history of things. The second half were Nocturno Culto takes over is potty rather than potted though as he really does not sound comfortable and indeed says he finds it difficult talking about things and goes off on some rather strange tangents.
Having not got this first time around I at first thought indeed, die hard listeners only but like a particularly festering boil this has grown on me with its gnarly fortitude. It certainly does not give a technical feel one would attribute to anything remotely modern sounding, opener ‘Rex’ has some classic sounding Frostian guitar lines coursing through it with rough as sandpaper vocals. Well that is until the first of what can only described as falsetto vocal croons come through and leave you wondering wtf is that all about. Yes these are incredibly odd and one wonders what they were thinking of with these but there you go, King Diamond had very little to worry about. The barbaric thrust of songs which I have to say the new artwork on this reissue goes incredibly well with sum up all sort of prehistoric images. This is early man on the hunt, foraging for food with roughly hued weapons or perhaps barking at the moon and worshipping its power and declaring it his god.
To many I am sure this sounds like unfettered noise but the bass heavy riffing and clattering drums and snares along with beastly vocals soon bite in and songs such as ‘(The) Grimness Of Which Shepherds Mourn’ and the feral scream courtesy of Satyr at start of ‘Sadomasochistic Rites’ gradually win you over. The doom laden approach also is one that festers away nicely rather than seeing the band go for the speed that they would later encompass in more detail. Occasionally though there are bursts of this, stumbling along in headlong panic and battering away hell for leather.
So is this one that you should pick up or should you avoid it like the plague? Well It’s certainly not an album for everyone and those blackpackers just looking for scene points by adding it to their collection should think again, besides why have you not got original demo tapes of it from cost a bomb auction sites. I like this and appreciate the history lesson it gives so if you also missed it first time it’s worth a shot, just don’t say I didn’t warn you about those high notes!
http://www.peaceville.com/darkthrone
Pete Woods
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