Immortal’s ability to consistently release content since has fallen by the wayside since 2002 (although their quality was arguably ailing before that) between periods of legal disputes, side projects from band members, and that time in the 2000s when they were literally split up. Abbath has thrown his efforts into another side/solo project, and Season of Mist has seen fit to give us a sample from upcoming material – a semi-live studio track named “Fenrir Hunts”.
This track sounds more overtly like death/black metal than much of the Immortal members’ recent work, which were generally more oriented towards older forms of metal in songwriting even when their aesthetics were not. “Fenrir Hunts” strikes this reviewer as yet another highly polished, technically sound song with some nods to the need for varied structure in an otherwise fairly standard formula. In short, an acceptable effort, but not one that particularly excites me for this release, or one that compels me to listen to it over previously proven and enshrined classics like Pure Holocaust. I can hope that the full album will be more interesting when it comes out (and the early state of this song suggests room for improvement), but it seems most likely that this will be another soul-crushingly “okay” album.
Tags: 2015, abbath, Black Metal, immortal, mainstream metal
The term “Black metal” is like 4WD. Put it on the sticker and 20% of the poopulation will buy it just because.
BEHEMOTHCORE BULLSHIT. The Demonaz solo album was better than this.
If they did another At the Heart of Winter, I would honestly be okay with that. Everything Abbath et al have done post-Sons of Northern Darkness isn’t even recognizable as a product of the same musicians. If it didn’t have the Immortal name attached to it, no one would even suspect who was behind the project.
I blame the pod people.
Poor arrangement.
Has the patented Abbath face paint also, don’t worry how it has nothing to do with the look the others’ have got going. Kill this world already.
Gabe, I have an article ready if you want to run it. What email should I send it to?
Guest articles, like pretty much everything else, go to editor@deathmetal.org. Make sure to mention the name you want to be credited under in your email, and if it meets our quality standards, it’ll go into the pipeline.
Boring.
There’s some interesting things going on with this track. You can tell Abbath has excelled as a guitar player. It’s peeked my interest and I’ll definitely check out the album.
Battle… Legal battles in the North! UAAAGH