Immortal's watershed release
Immortal are now one of the undisputedly godliest icons of the Norwegian black metal circuit. But everybody has to start somewhere. The earliest parts of the band's career consisted of extremely raw and heavy black metal albums which ranged from mediocre-to-pretty good. (Although, granted, one exception to this rule has to be made for 1997's "Blizzard Beasts," which opted for a brutal black metal-by-way-of-Morbid Angel-lite-American death metal approach. The album was an exceptional one, thanks largely to Horgh's inhuman drumming.) And sure, many flashes of brilliance could frequently be heard throughout the band's career as young musicians. But something was usually still left to be desired from these early efforts. Various drawbacks included a lack of coast-to-coast consistency, a truly groundbreaking and landmark sound, and crisp and articulate production jobs. And there was an occasional rush job - the kind that left listeners scratching their heads. Everybody knew they were more-than-capable of finally releasing the great album that everybody knew they had in them. Only then could the group could the band fully grasp the true greatness and staying power that they had been flirting with for so many years. And only then could they start to warrant the status that they are now deadlocked in. Well, all of that changed starting with the year 1999. With Horgh now a committed, full-time member Immortal could now settle down, and devote more of their time to more important things. Great songwriting and increasingly technical musicianship being two main examples. And lucky for us, their efforts paid off. Big time, too, because the result was `99's "At The Heart Of Winter," which was not only a satisfying new album, and a completely realized affair. It is the sound of a band that is now truly firing on all cylinders, too. So, frankly put, it is an indisputably smashing success on all fronts. Some elements remain from previous works, including skin-crawling and venomous vocal rasps that remain as true to pure black metal as ever. Overall, though, a huge improvement (who said "change") in sound has been made, here. As a result, Immortal suddenly sound many years smarter and more mature. Only six songs may be presented here, but Immortal make more out of them than most bands can do with at least twice as many. Pick any given one of them, and you are sure to be satiated with it. Why? Because not-a-one of them isn't extremely expansive, innovative, complex, tight as a drum, epically epic (with songs being in the six-to-eight minutes margin), deliciously multi-faceted, and brillliantly written. The guitars are definitely the most integral part of the music is definitely the guitars, so it is imperative that Abbath sounds more dangerous than ever before. Well, he accomplished that goal without even breaking a sweat. After obviously spent some time boning up on some of metal's all-time most important genres, Eighties thrash, he is able to create mountains and mountains of wonderful shredding. Sounding almost like he is constantly engaged in a dogfight with himself, Abbath deftly spits out insanely intricate, razor-sharp, wrist-spraining, and positively godly riffage, fiery thrash picking, impeccably tight leads, and exceptional solos. Elsewhere, it is impossible to not mention Horgh, the man who has been one of the finest drummers in black metal for quite a while now. And he is also the man who anchors these songs with an endless flood of blistering, foundation-shaking black metal blasts, and occasional Lombardo-worthy thrash beats. Yet, for all of its brutal and breakneck parts and qualities, the music simultaneously manages to also include melody. Fortunately, unlike many-a-black-metal case, these melodies are never boring or tacked on. But they never feel excessive, either. So that is another big part of what makes "At The Heart Of Winter" so masterful. It expertly weaves in things like tastefully melodic guitar work and occasional keyboard flourishes to create melodic parts that are as prominent as they are memorable and infectious. The standouts are many. The double-kick-backed opener "Withstand The Fall Of Time" splits its time equally between revving up the engines with propulsive, crunching thrash, and settling back down into more restrained chugging and mid-tempo grooves. Regardless of the speed the guitars, though, Horgh can always be heard thumping away at his bass drum like there's no tomorrow. Following this, the next couple of tracks "Solarfall" and "Tragedies Blows At Horizon" come next, and they much alike one-another. Opting for a really blistering approach, these two tracks could easily be mistaken for a prime couple of pieces of thrash from two decades ago. They both recall the halcyon days from the likes of Slayer, Kreator, Sodom, Sadus, Testament, Sepultura, Dark Angel, etc. "Solarfall" and "Tragedies Blows At Horizon" are also similar in that, aside from the occasional and brief dabbling with a softly picked-string softly-picked string section, they both continuously shred your speakers. The former offsets some squealing guitar runs with busy, chunked-up picking; and the latter has really huge riffs anchored by slamming drum blasts. Continuing on, even though there should have never been any debate about it before, "Where Dark And Light Don't Differ", with its guitar leads that are positively scorching and fairly strong and solid bass work, further ensures that the intensity level is firmly glued in the upper red zone. The title tune is perhaps the best of the whole bunch. It begins as a awesomely beautiful and atmosphere-enhancing serene ballad with a lush musical arrangement comprised of thoroughly noteworthy and spacey-sounding keyboards, docile melodic guitar strums, and a faint choral backing vocal line. Eventually, though, it all ends up being heavy as a ton of bricks - brutal drumming and monstrous stop-start guitar flurries steamroll everything around. Lastly, we get "Years Of Silent Sorrow," which is basically one, long, inexorable flood of great, biting, nerve-damaging buzzsaw speed metal riffage. "At The Heart Of Winter" not only stands as easily the finest installment in Immortal's long and storied discography, and is in and by itself a landmark metal album. And no matter which genre it belongs to (black, thrash, speed, or symphonic metal), it should be equally regarded as essential listening. Read more