•
Rating:
"Desert, night, coyotes feel the cold wave of dark, red eyes eat through the vast nocturnal landscape, a strong light... the only light"
"A Blaze In The Northern Sky" begins like this, with the grim and sinister introduction of "Kathaarian Life Code". A formula is repeated by dark voices (rumored to be Fenriz) while Nocturno Culto spits out words like a snake that is tired of staying inside a damn Norwegian hole...
"We are a blaze... in the northern... sky !" ...then the sonic massacre begins with Nocturno's guitar and Fenriz's "dirty" drums, which, however, lasts rather briefly. In fact, the song stops immediately to continue at a slow pace, which makes this "life code" even more engaging for all of its 10-minute duration. Because Darkthrone is the only light in this eternally black sky dotted with extinguished stars, year 1991 (year of recording). From the cover (which, along with those of "Transilvanian Hunger" and "Under a Funeral Moon," will make history), Zephyrous smiles malevolently at us, with hands spread as if he wants to drag us into his darkness...
"As once they gazed upon the hillside searching for the memories..."
"In The Shadow Of The Horns," distorted guitars as usual in black... yet Darkthrone has that ability to create such a dirty sound ("like elementary school bathrooms," a friend of mine used to say) that their compositions stand out very well from other sweet (?!) black metal songs. Memories, reminiscences... I recently saw some videos on the internet where Fenriz and Nocturno Culto talk about the recordings of the early albums... the following quote from Nocturno stayed impressed in my mind:
"You know, when we recorded "A Blaze In The Northern Sky"... we just took all that death metal riffs of "A Soulside Journey", and played them in a black metal style ...the result was this album... Peaceville (their label at the time) listened to the record and said: "what the fuck is this? this is not death metal, we signed you as a death metal band" ...then I said that we changed our style totally (also thanks to Euronymous, whom Darkthrone met during the summer of '90) and that was our future ...they released the record ...nobody regrets that now!"
Listening to a Darkthrone album is like embarking on a journey with no destination, not knowing the road but always knowing where to step ...there's never a moment where it's possible to get lost. The entire work flows with compositions that are very similar to each other and all closely connected. However beautiful, and that’s how black should be. Pure. Raw (not always, but that's another story). Norwegian? It doesn't matter. Unfortunately, there are Cradle Of Filth who haven't listened to Euronymous's words, and now they sell and are loaded with money and are pure/fucking/black/metal/evil/satan/monsters. But that's another story as well.
"Paragon Belial," third track : "Simulating a spectre shadow...". Nocturno's voice seems close, maybe he's around the corner, waiting for us... or maybe not. Maybe he's getting drunk in some bar nearby the studio along with Fenriz. Who knows.
The devastating "Where Cold Winds Blow" comes like a bolt from the blue (well, not really clear). The most violent of the album. The guitars are barely audible; the drumming is super fast, and Nocturno with that voice of his reminiscent of a possessed monk (he really has a godlike voice! hmmm...).
To conclude beautifully the walk in the northern sky with the unforgettable title track. It too, like "Kathaarian Life Code," features a slowed tempo in the middle, captivating in its malevolent simplicity. An attempt at melody (a term not present in most black metal bands' composition dictionaries) by Nocturno, maybe 4, 5 notes... damnably brilliant.
Unfortunately, the pagan winter came, calling upon the brave Norwegian knights, and left as a legacy to the world one of the greatest black metal albums ever written, played, produced. The highest rating applies both to the music and the immortal cover... bwahahaha it's cold here. I'm going to cover my face with some corpse paint...
Tracklist Lyrics and Samples
01 Kathaarian Life Code (10:39)
Desert... Night...
Coyotes feel the cold wave of the dark
Red eyes eats through
The vast nocturnal landscape
A strong light - the only night
This is where he made sculptures
From the visions that created the force
Baphomet in steel
For the flesh of cain
A throne made by remains
Of twelve holy disciples
New disciples rose
One by one, ten by ten
All met under the desert moonlight
Knowledge fired across the landscape
Sparks that mixed with coyote eyes
Diabolic forces in a ceremonial union
And each beast of the land
Took its own way in living
The seven forbidden things
Were eternally desecrated
Kathaaria was built - world without end
02 In the Shadow of the Horns (07:01)
Face of the goat in the mirror
Eyes burn like an october sunrise
As once they gazed upon the hillside
Searching for the memories...
In the shadow of the horns
Only seen by the kings
Of the dawn of the first millennium
Upon the thrones
In the shadow of the horns
Cleansed like the air in the night
World without end
We've become a race of the cursed seeds
For five united forces
In the eternal dawn
The kings that held their heads high
The triumph of chaos - has guided our path
We circles the holy Sinai - our swords gave wings
Invisible force of our abyssic hate
Our seeds boil as we gaze upon the new millennium
Weeping by the graves of the glorious ones
So the hardened frost melts away
Clouds gather across a freezing moon
I kiss the goat - witchcraft still breathes
03 Paragon Belial (05:24)
I lay Enshrined
Contaminated Time Warp
My Flesh Yearns
For the Tombworld
My soul like layers of Frost
Simulating a Spectre Shadow
Frozen in Time and Space
I was Hacked out of Ice
Faded am I, behind a wall of consciousness
Still feeling a different World
Surrounding Me
Chilling Voices fill my head -
I Open My Eyes;
The Boiling Sea Beneath
The Castle of Faust
Belial finally Comes Forth:
"The Ancient White light writings
were just lying men and their Pens
You are the same, only in Black.
Return with the knowledge
of making your own god"
Dreamking of the Tombworld:
I Enter Into an Eternal Oath
Creating my Paragon Belial
05 A Blaze in the Northern Sky (04:57)
Hear a haunting chant
Lying in the northern wind
As the sky turns black
Clouds of melancholy
Rape the beams
Of a devoid dying sun
And the distant fog approaches
Coven of forgotten delight
Hear the pride of a northern storm
Triumphant sight on a northern sky
Where the days are dark
And night the same
Moonlight drank the blood
Of a thousand pagan men
It took ten times a hundred years
Before the king on the northern throne
Was brought tales of the crucified one
Coven of renewed delight;
A thousand years have passed since then -
Years of lost pride and lust
Souls of blasphemy
Hear a haunting chant
We are a blaze in the northern sky
The next thousand years are ours
06 The Pagan Winter (06:34)
Horned master of endless time
Summon thy unholy disciples
Trained for centuries to come
Gather on the highest mountain
United by hatred;
The final superjoint ritual...
This, the pagan winter
Kept for the obscure ones
Candles hold the only light
Sextons hide in fear
For this eternal winter
A new god ruled the sky
The million hands of joy
Have something holy to burn
From the top of the world one could see
The white light servants flee
Engulfed in an infernal cyclone
Created by our blasphemy
Religious bodies crossed the sky
the vision was our wine
Roar of fire, feeble fools
Into the furnace fire
Loading comments slowly
Other reviews
By Fallen
"Darkthrone constructed that manifesto of True Norwegian Black Metal, surpassing every other extreme release of the era."
"The numerous tempo changes dictated by the skins are exhilarating… a destructive voice that only respects the cruel arpeggios of a torturous and lamenting guitar."
