Metal Reviews

I see, also to me there a little bit of a folk metal band wouldn't you say?

Sure, Agalloch are hard to describe. One thing I would not call them, at least after the demo, is a black metal band. If absolutely forced to pick I'd lean more towards doom.

to claim that Panopticon has never listened to Darkthrone or that many of these other bands have not as well is silly.

Even if they have listened to Darkthrone or any decent lesser known black metal band, the outcome of their music sucking less would never happen.

I mean the fans, sorry. USBMer fans. I'm thinking of USBMer fans like Heatseaker, I realize people like yourself or Rio are going to be much more versed in what came before.

I don't know why people care about fans so much. I've never met someone not on the internet who listens to the new USBM you refer to besides people who know WITTR and they know Wolves back when Two Hunters came out, they don't know who Weakling is and they aren't part of the "trend". What does it matter if the fans don't know Darkthrone, I care what people like Austin Lunn listen to, i.e., people who actually make the music which the sound is going to influence.

Well the problem is just that they are missing out on what I consider essential black metal. Unlike some, I do try to engage USBM, otherwise why would I try to listen to Liturgy and Krallice and Panopticon and WITTR and all these other bands and try to give an unbiased opinion?

Sargeist- Let the Devil in

from finland but has some amazing riffs, was reviewed here, modern band to.

USBM just pretty much sucks imo.

Dissection - Storm of the Light's bane. It's not from norway.

Behemoth has a had a rather prolific career.

It matters because for the most part WITTR barely play black metal and none of the bands you listen to (Deafheaven, Krallice, Ash Borer) operate with the bm aesthetic. They take certain bm elements and synthesize them with art rock and ambient faggotry, but make no mistake about it this is a thread about lesser known black metal- not glitzy latte sipping losers trending the sound up with extended ambient instrumentals and a left wing crackpot ideology .

Rotting Christ - Thy Mighty Contract
Rotting Christ - Non Serviam
Dissection - Storm of the Light's Bane

As Sahar - Phenomistik (Singapore)
Langsuyr - The Eastern Cruelty EP (Malaysia)

The last two have enormous impact on the South East Asian scene. Thought I'd just share that with you guys.

Someone is forgetting Impiety

You're right! How could I?! Thanks for reminding me



Impiety - Kaos Kommand 696

Absu, Melechesh, and Ruins of Beverast come to mind.

Absu and Melechesh have sort of lost it, and Ruins of Beverast is hardly black metal anymore, but Tara, Sphynx, and Unlock the Shrine are, in my view, black metal classics of the last 10 or so years.

I love Absu but their latter works take a more death/thrash vibe, with Barathrum Vitriol and Sun of Tiphareth being their only two actual bm efforts.

Not entirely keen on arguing genre semantics, but I will say that I wouldn't call Tara death metal. It's not second wave bm by any means, but I figured avoiding that scene is more or less the express purpose of this thread.

Thorns, Burzum, et al. may have established what is commonly considered the "black metal" sound, but it is of course the second wave. You don't need to sound like Mayhem to be black metal. I don't think I'm going out on a limb here either, I'd say the common consensus is that it's indeed a black/thrash album, and Absu is generally considered a major part of the USBM scene.

Disagree.

If I'm to go with black metal by its original definition, I'd be tempted to say Venom's classic Black Metal or perhaps one of my all-time favourite albums in Cradle of Filth's primitive meshing of black, death, and gothic metal with The Principle of Evil Made Flesh.

However, as it pertains to second wave black metal, I might side with one of Graveland's early releases.

But really, as far as most essential goes, Bathory is undoubtedly the answer to this question. The Norwegians owe most of their sound to Bathory.

No, Paysage D'hiver is fucking awesome.

Also on topic:

Beherit - Drawing Down The Moon