Dimmu Borgir
In Sorte Diaboli

THE REVIEW

No.
We're just not there.

Well, I've always defended Dimmu Borgir, even when they remastered "Stormblast"; I have always supported and defended them despite having embarked on a path that has very little good in "Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia" where they went excessively into experimentation and the upheaval of their style, which has always been a bit contested, even in "Death Cult Armageddon" where they definitively distanced themselves from their origins and sank into the mainstream quagmire, from which it is very difficult to emerge. Well, now (or rather, a little less than a year ago) they come out with this "In Sorte Diaboli", so eagerly awaited by fans and hailed (!!) as a "powerful, sinister, extreme" record.
Since there are already two reviews on this CD, which express more or less the same purely positive opinion, I thought it was risky to publish a third one: but, as you may have noticed once, I publish duplicates if and only if I want to express a different opinion according to my personal points of view.

Now that I've exhausted the preliminaries, let’s get straight to the point: this CD is crap (forgive me, but sometimes I resort to bad language). This "In sorte Diaboli" doesn't say ANYTHING new, nothing that can draw praise from the public, it has no soul and its merits, if they can be so called, are a tenth of the flaws. It is flat, empty, the shamefully faded image of a band that fifteen years ago had a lot to say and now, running out of ideas, has decided to lower themselves to the levels of any "extreme" commercial band. Of course, the word commercial in Metal should be taken with a grain of salt, but I can't think of other terms to discredit the album in question.
The problem for the DB now is the total absence of ideas, but if they have no more ideas they could also stop violating music and thus avoid making some unfortunate fan spend more than 20 euros who, trustingly, burns their allowance on a... A... Such garbage.

You must be getting tired of hearing me throw unjustified invectives, so let's analyze the album in detail, even though it’s difficult to talk about relevant details in a CD like this.
First of all, it would be natural to link to the band's previous works to make some comparisons: we can say what we do NOT find in "In Sorte Diaboli", such as the raw and furious melancholy of "For All Tid" (oh, that one was a masterpiece), the palpable fog of "Stormblast", the elegant and overflowing power of "Enthrone Darkness Triumphant", the excellent keyboard virtuosity of "Spiritual Black Dimensions", even the innovative violence of "Puritanical Euphoric Misantropia" and, although less important, the apocalyptic atmospheres of "Death Cult Armageddon". Ergo, forget all that and put the CD in the player.

Of course, the single "The Serpentine Offering" is an excellent track, striking in its majesty, but what do we find beautiful in the other eight tracks?
I'll tell you what we find:

CHUGGA CHUGGA CHUGGA*
TRUMTRUMTRUM TRON TRON TRON**
"BWHAHAHA IN SORTE DIABOLIII WOO WOOO SATAN I GIVE YOU MY SOUL"***

This is what this album tells us. I'm sorry to have deplorably resorted to a few onomatopoeias to express myself, however a big part of the CD can be perfectly summarized like this, I'm not kidding. In all the tracks, we find a shadow, a horrible caricature of Dimmu, see "The Sacrilegious Scorn", which awkwardly tries to imitate much more worthy tracks like "Mourning Palace" or "Reptile"; "The Sinister Awakening", which sadly emulates the not-so-successful "Death Cult Armageddon"; finally "The Chosen Legacy", a quick and superficial reprise of the madness of "Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia". All supported by a very solid base that unfortunately lacks consistency. It is sad.
So why are there some tracks that are particularly appreciated by those who love this "thing"? There must be some reason... But it is simple: almost all the songs aim to capture attention in the first 20-30 seconds; pay attention, doesn’t "The Chosen Legacy" start with a Hellhammer in great shape inviting Metallers to unleash in a frantic headbanging? And doesn’t "The Invaluable Darkness" start off great with a guitar and keyboard loop of indisputable beauty? Furthermore, I try to imagine the amazed expression of some gullible person who, hearing the first part of "The Fundamental Alienation" says all excited and happy: "Wow, even satanic choirs! Awesome!!!", when the rest of the song (and the songs) does not turn out to be inspired or convincing; too bad that the 9 tracks do not last only 30 seconds, but around four/five minutes. It all seems so "fake". I also find that the definition of an "extreme" record is a bit daring since it is not clear whether Dimmu are eminently taking us for a ride... Ahem, backside.

Even the concept on which the album is centered is somewhat pathetic: at this point, I'll watch Star Wars if I want to hear the story of someone who gives in to the "dark side". I have nothing more to say, I hope I have expressed myself well enough.

Legend:
* Annoying mishmash of guitar riffs, monotonous and expressionless.
** Explosive mix between Hellhammer's pounding drums and the earlier CHUGGA CHUGGA, very similar to a train running.
*** An overexcited Shagrath falling into the most absurd clichés of "black" Metal.