First of all I would like to point out that I worship early Darkthrone. I think that albums such as "Transylvanian Hunger" and "Under a Funeral Moon" are some of the best black metal albums ever released. Although it is not as good as the previous work I quite liked their last release, "Total Death".

When writing this I have had this advance tape for two days. I have listened to it a lot of times by now, enough to get an overall impression. To say I am disappointed is not quite true. Considering the utter gayness of the last few Moonfog releases I guess this was what could be expected. Especially since I heard what the album title was supposed to be. Still, this is Darkthrone we are talking about so I was hoping that I would be pleasantly surprised, but as you have probably figured by now, this was not the case.

I will admit that there are a few riffs that are good, some of them even sounding like Darkthrone. But, gone is the whole Darkthrone sound, the cold, vile and evil atmosphere. The songs are mostly slow, there are hardly any blast beats at all. The first three songs are more or less Celtic Frost/ Hellhammer rip-offs, but nowhere near as good as the songs in the same vein on the "Panzerfaust" album. They lack feeling and sound way too plastic and sterile. The three remaining songs are a bit better, having some interesting riffs but not quite qualifying as good songs. Nocturno Culto's vocals are quite decent though, more or less sounding like the ones on "Total Death".

To sum this up, I am quite aware of the fact that this review will piss some people off. There are probably lots of people who will enjoy this album. Good for them, but for me this is the end of Darkthrone's era.

© 1999 blodsband