There’s plenty of black metal that hides behind opaque production and crummy mixes to imply a vastness of sound and plenty more that shift so slowly between chords or notes that their tremolo pick turns their records into post-rock whether intentionally or not (the wave of post-black metal deliberately making this connection didn’t invent it ab nihilo, after all). Demonaz’s lightning-fast black metal riffing, closer to thrash than to anything else, shred across the 40-minute record. Thankfully, Immortal for the most part deliver.
To top all of these issues off, it’s also their first new record in nearly a decade. It’s also simultaneously the first time that Demonaz has stepped into the role of guitarist for the band in over 20 years, as well as his first turn behind the mic for the group. After all, it’s the first Immortal record written and recorded without frontman and lead guitarist Abbath, a fixture of both the band and black metal in general for the past nearly 30 years.
Originally written for Metalegion #4 - was a great question mark over Northern Chaos Gods. That makes for a satisfying blend for the army of supporters, meaning that even those less worshipful should recognize Northern Chaos Gods as a strong return for the cult of Immortal. Brief use of clean guitar in the introduction of nine minute closer ‘Mighty Ravendark’ signals that At the Heart of Winter formed a template for some of the more explorative material, although the duo (backed up by Peter Tägtgren standing in on bass) generally stick to five minutes for greater impact and less of an epic atmosphere. ‘Grim and Dark’ proves that a simple riff can pay dividends with a bouncy yet savage hook that will catch listeners first time round, while ‘Into Battle Ride’ aims to be an anthemic romp and largely succeeds as one of the shorter songs. Mid-pace predominates on songs like ‘Where Mountains Rise’, though the ambush of the opening title track proves that Northern Chaos Gods is anything but a slow album, even if Horgh is the one powering the pace on the drumkit.Ĭompared to the occasionally forgettable first comeback All Shall Fall, the latest album features some attention-grabbing cuts. Horgh provides all the freezing blasting that befits song titles like ‘Called to Ice’ and ‘Grim and Dark’ (yes, Blashyrkh and Ravendark both turn up too), the guitars keeping their massive bulk as Demonaz whips through a bunch of brisk chord-based riffs like the tendinitis never happened. However, nothing can prevent Northern Chaos Gods sounding exactly like Immortal, because the sound of the Norwegians has been well-established way back since At the Heart of Winter differentiated them from their ‘90s peers once and for all. To point out the differences in sound between the new and old, Demonaz’s vocals register less as the “evil frog” approach of Abbath and more of a standard raspy growl, while the riffing has edged back towards black metal orthodoxy and away from the monstrous icy thrash of Sons of Northern Darkness. It seems befitting of such a commercial group as Kiss that their extreme metal lookalikes would make their line-up change around the trademarking of a name, so Demonaz and Horgh deciding in 2015 to venture on without Abbath might be viewed as a mammoth change, though it hasn’t changed the new album a great deal. Accessible sound within their genre: check. Familiar, easily identifiable, themes: check. They might not be massive on the same scale, but let’s consider it properly. Like their heroes Kiss, Immortal are a massive cult band.
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