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Class 6(66)
Emperor: Anthems to the welkin at dusk
18/05/07 || Global Domination
Released: 1997
Introduction
This album holds a special place in my collection, since it was the first black metal release I ever listened to. Wait, let me rephrase that: this album fucken got me into black metal! This is a genre highlight, an outstanding effort from masters of the craft, one of the best of all time ever spawned from any black metal act. This is Emperor at their creative peak, and that boys, was a fearsomely indecent proposal while it lasted.
Songwriting
10. From the evil reek of the opening intro “Alsvatr” until the cold longing feel of “The Wanderer”, we are subjected to a relentless aural assault. The main ingredients are hyper speed riffing mixed with subtle keyboards, creating a cold landscape of symphonic madness, with waterfalls of blastbeats. Emperor is able to summon an epic feeling unmatched by few other black acts in their compositions. The songs flow beautifully in their brutality, with well placed bridges and breaks, bombastic indeed. All songs are remarkable, but if I had to pick highlights, both “Ye Entrancemperium” and “The Loss and Curse of Reverence” are utter kick-ass numbers.
Production
7. Not the best out there. I guess it easy to summon Satan for inspiration in the studio, but very difficult to make him conjure a decent keyboard sound. Shrill, high pitched stuff, but it fits well the atmosphere Emperor creates, and it’s doesn’t degenerate into the “trve” sound, you know? Yeah, I’m talking about that dental drill buzz that you get from Darkthrone’s records, fuck them all with rusty dildo’s! Still, by the genre’s bleak production standards, not the worse out there either. The mix is fairly even, all in all.
Guitars
8. Ihshan and Samoth do a great job here, not in the sense of extreme virtuosity in the playing skill sense, but still more than recommended for black metal. The riffs are amazing, slow and heavy sometimes, blazing fast most of the time, but without losing coherence.
Vocals
10. Inhuman shrieking, whispered darks oaths, classic black metal screams, clean vocal chants, we get the full spectrum here from Ihsahn. It adds new dimensions to the music that were not present in their previous works. Delivering with confidence, Ihsahn came of age here with an ace performance.
Bass
4. Buried in the mix pretty much, but it was expected, wasn’t it? Given the usual black metal productions, at least some creep is credited with having played bass on the album.
Drums
8. Trym is the one of the best black metal drummers ever, and this album is a testament to this. Blast beats reign supreme, but he covers all the bases, executes all sorts of fills and maintains a relentless tempo all the way through.
Lyrics
8. Satanic, poetic, dark inspired words. Doesn’t come across as cheesy as some of their contemporaries, though, and that’s good in my book for at least a blood ritual and sacrificing some Christians on a black metal picnic at the winter forest, or something similar, ain’t it?
Cover art
8. The apocalyptic, infernal sense of the record is definitely reinforced by the well-crafted cover. It’s a famous engraving or painting, fuck me if I know whose, though. Let’s just print them life size and take to a couple of local churches and nail them to the doors to piss some people off. Then burn the church! Every Emperor fan should at least think of burning a church at some point, or have his “black-metalness” questioned. Thinking of it while extremely drunk is good enough, isn’t it?
Logo
10. Very fucken classy and elegant, I must say. One of the best ever, befitting the imperial bandname indeed.
Booklet
8. More engravings, and the usual info, but nicely done. It’s a bit green though, is green metal? Hmm, not likely, but at least is a sickly green, it fucken hurts me eyes.
Overall and ending rant
9. Ultimately, “Anthems…” remains a black metal landmark, the true everlasting achievement of Emperor’s career, their finest moment of unmatched fury, their fucken epitaph if any needs to be written. A fucken must own, black metal doesn’t get any better than this. All hail the Emperor!