NECROFIER

Prophecies Of Eternal Darkness

Season Of Mist
rating icon 8 / 10

Track listing:

01. The Black Flame Burns
02. Darker Than The Night
03. Madness Descends
04. Return To Chaos
05. Death Comes For Us All
06. Unholy Hunger
07. Betrayal Of The Queen
08. Plague Requiem


Try to avoid driving or operating machinery when you listen to "The Black Flame Burns" for the first time. The opening track on NECROFIER's debut album has an untamed and dangerous feel to it, as if these Texan reprobates were genuinely channeling evil forces and hoping for a swift escalation in hostilities with anyone silly enough to be nearby at the time. With scabrous gang vocals and an unstoppable, unholy D-beat percussive pulse provided by drummer Dobber Beverly (OCEANS OF SLUMBER / INSECT WARFARE),it's a succinct but lethal thrill ride of punked-up but blasphemous punchiness, replete with subtly insidious melodic hooks. Next, "Darker Than The Night" errs toward a more atmospheric and woozy approach, but still with those malicious undercurrents and a whole heap of infernal muscle backing them up. "Madness Descends" is a malevolent waltz through the flames of Hell, with a psychotic, blast-furnace climax. "Return To Chaos" is a full-on, bug-eyed, blackened grind explosion, delivered at a dizzying pace and yet dense with morbid dread.

The second half of "Prophecies of Eternal Darkness" is every bit as compelling as the first. "Death Comes For Us All" is a frenzied blur of hyper-speed aggro and epic, storm-inciting grandeur; "Unholy Hunger" takes the icy menace of the early '90s and welds it to a bludgeoning, machine-gun kick-drum attack that rumbles and devours like a fleet of Panzers; "Betrayal Of The Queen" slows the tempo, spawning the album's most grotesque and unsettling moments in the process, as NECROFIER's collective eyeballs roll into the back of their devilish skulls and sludge consumes the sonic foreground. The closing "Plague Requiem" — a sparse and evocative ambient instrumental, layered with disembodied voices and peppered with ominous thuds and viscous drones — is a soul-churning climax to cherish.

Black metal seldom lacks convincing exponents, but the US scene has often seemed to be stoically battling against the supremacy of the frozen European north to little avail. NECROFIER sound better equipped for the campaign ahead than most, and "Prophecies of Eternal Darkness" absolutely reeks of authenticity and hellish intent.

Author: Dom Lawson
  • facebook
  • twitter
  • reddit
  • email

Comments Disclaimer And Information

BLABBERMOUTH.NET uses the Facebook Comments plugin to let people comment on content on the site using their Facebook account. The comments reside on Facebook servers and are not stored on BLABBERMOUTH.NET. To comment on a BLABBERMOUTH.NET story or review, you must be logged in to an active personal account on Facebook. Once you're logged in, you will be able to comment. User comments or postings do not reflect the viewpoint of BLABBERMOUTH.NET and BLABBERMOUTH.NET does not endorse, or guarantee the accuracy of, any user comment. To report spam or any abusive, obscene, defamatory, racist, homophobic or threatening comments, or anything that may violate any applicable laws, use the "Report to Facebook" and "Mark as spam" links that appear next to the comments themselves. To do so, click the downward arrow on the top-right corner of the Facebook comment (the arrow is invisible until you roll over it) and select the appropriate action. You can also send an e-mail to blabbermouthinbox(@)gmail.com with pertinent details. BLABBERMOUTH.NET reserves the right to "hide" comments that may be considered offensive, illegal or inappropriate and to "ban" users that violate the site's Terms Of Service. Hidden comments will still appear to the user and to the user's Facebook friends. If a new comment is published from a "banned" user or contains a blacklisted word, this comment will automatically have limited visibility (the "banned" user's comments will only be visible to the user and the user's Facebook friends).