“Judas, the only one who hasn’t lied to us…”
Following a promo and two split releases in 1994 and 1995, for some, this is how Belgian black metal band Enthroned introduced themselves to the world with their first album. Hadean brings together the band’s first four albums and an EP with a bunch of bonus tracks in a 5CD flip-top boxset that includes an in-depth interview with and unreleased archive photos supplied by mainman Nornagest in a 16-page booklet.
A blistering blast of malevolence and evil, 1995’s Prophecies of Pagan Fire remains an absolute beast of an album. A darkly atmospheric synth that leads into a beautifully gloomy acoustic piece, the opening title track is a truly remarkable and considered composition. This track contains the very elements that have long since mark Enthroned out as a band much deserving of every grim accolade that black metal will allow. From the concentrated filth and fire of ‘Deny The Holy Book of Lies’ and ‘Under The Holocaust’ to the longer ‘Skjeldenland’ and ‘At Dawn Of A Funeral Winter’, Prophecies of Pagan Fire is melodic, haunting, hypnotic, and ritualistic throughout, relentlessly so, traits that persist to this day in the blackened barrages of this band. Of course, hindsight is always 20/20, and the essence of a band is always much easier to discern after eleven albums, two EPs, five splits, and numerous other releases in a hitherto thirty-year career, but the black fire that fuels this album burns through their entire oeuvre.
In April 1997, founder member and drummer, Cernunnos, committed suicide, just a week before the band were set to record Towards the Skullthrone of Satan. Where such an event could easily have marred the album, the band took the negative energy and poured it into the recording. A more-than worthy successor to their striking debut, the album is pure black metal and sees Enthroned refining their sound and developing their dark art of blending melody with massacre. An uncompromising and merciless onslaught of blackened brutality, the intricate structures and tempo shifts of tracks such as ‘Evil Church’, ‘The Antichrist Summons The Black Flame’ and ‘The Forest Of Nathrath’ demonstrate a significant development in the band’s musicianship. This is no doubt due to Nornagest and Nebiros taking over on guitars, two musicians whose contributions to Enthroned cannot be overstated.
In tribute to Cernunnos, in 1998 the band released the Regie Sathanas EP that includes a cover of Sodom’s ‘The Conqueror’ alongside two new tracks and a reworked version of ‘Satan Never Sleeps’ from Cernunnos and Lord Sabathon’s death metal days as Morbid Death. An interesting collection of curios, here it is combined with previously unreleased demos and tracks from ‘Commanders of Chaos’, an unofficial 2000 release of live material that has – startlingly, particularly for black metal – excellent sound quality. Sitting between CDs 2 and 4, this provides an excellent into the origins of band’s sound and the power of their live performances.
1999’s The Apocalypse Manifesto sees the band shifting the tempos up and up and up. This album is relentless. Utterly vicious. A battery of black metal blasphemy blasted at a million miles per hour. And what better way to close the album than with the 72-second ripper ‘Crucifuck’? 2001’s Armoured Bestial Hell saw Nebiros being replaced by Nerath Daemon who remains with the band to this day, and whose presence is scorched into this album. Primitive, ferocious, and raging, the guitarists thrash out cut-throat riffs and searing leads, Namroth Blackthorn’s drums are incessant, a battery of blast beat brutrality, and Lord Sabathon’s pure blackened bile is spat out in blood-soaked and broken-toothed glory.
Gloriously barbaric, this collection is a must, not only for Enthroned fans wishing to complete their collection, but for black metal devotees who may have missed Belgium’s most brutal export. It’s available through Cherry Red here.
Review by Jason Guest
