Every once and a while, an album slides into my aural vacuum of hate and pulls my attention away from everything else in my collection. Reasons for this can vary depending upon the album and my personal situation at the time (i.e. an Anal Cunt album comes in just after the neighbors put up wind chimes). Anyhow, the album in question here is Darkthrone's Panzerfaust. Words fail to describe the sort of raw black power and emotion that pours from such a release. Couple that with the cool Celtic Frost style riffing and you have one powerful release. The guitars have a total raw coldness to them; high bass grind, yet still contain plenty of mid and treble to please the ear. The vocals possess a gut retching vomit that tears the vocal cords right out of Nocturno Culto's throat. I found that one of the most extreme and great factors of this album is the sheer number of moods it can evoke or compliment. The cold desolation of the nihilism of a lost soul, the hate-fueled anger of the oppressed, the sardonic, angst filled and mocking world of the older metal generation - all found within this one disc. To sum it all up, a black metal collection without this disc is not a black metal collection at all; buy it and worship it.

© 1998 grotesque