Throne of Katarsis: Helvete – Det Iskalde Mørket
This is the third offering from this Candelight-signed Norwegian duo. It’s pretty much a continuation from their Unholy Holocaustwinds EP and debut album An Eternal Dark Horizon in so much as the sound and production are very similar if not identical.
Usually that would be a bad thing but not here. Throne of Katarsis have achieved something that a ton of bands in the genre try to do but fail: be old school. As with their earlier releases, Helvete – Det Iskalde Morket is rammed full of black old school atmosphere with big, long, reverb-soaked riffs and vocals pinned down by a great drum sound featuring deep orchestral fills and rolls.
There are some nice subtle acoustic guitar parts creeping around underneath the electric ones that also add a ton of that cold and morbid magic. Other parts also show flashes of excellence with plentiful – although I hate to draw comparison – Burzum style riffs. Their trademark lengthy tunes make up the main bulk of this album, again with the shortest song a little over six minutes, the longest weighs in at seventeen minutes!
There was something about Helvete – Det Iskalde Morket that took me a while to figure out: there are only, for my tastes, three proper songs out of the five as the two longest ones seem to be just three or four long passages stuck together.
While I think Throne of Katarsis have experimented and expanded on their previous writings, the longer songs feel unnecessarily long and a little tedious. That said they make great music for questing (if you plan online games) and if you’re a big fan of the band I’m sure you’ll love it.
I admit I was more than a little sceptical when I got a request to review this Italian band. I wasn’t sure what to expect from a band that sounded more like some American gospel singers than satanic Black Metal! Thankfully after literally one second of listening my somewhat ridiculous assumptions were raped and pillaged [...]
I only recently discovered Rahu, who purvey original and very replayable Finish Black Metal of the highest calibre. This is a demo from 2008 that has since been released as part of a best of featuring this and their other demo on one CD. Although there are only three tracks delivering a mere seventeen minutes [...]
for some reason I’m not impressed.. decent, and that’s it..
Finally got it, thanks to Infamroth.
Well, it is fucking necro. Takes the old, and makes it older and bleaker.
Great.