Dimmu Borgir - Enthrone Darkness Triumphant

Well, to read the reviews out there, this is the ultimate black metal album since Bathory's The Return. Not being the biggest black metal fan (but quickly becoming a convert), I hesitated for quite some time before picking this up. I guess I finally got it since both tracks I had heard (the incredibly raw version of MOD on Death is... Vol 4 and Spellbound on the Blackend Comp) were some of the catchiest compositions in the evil music circuit. So, with all this buildup, you almost completely expect disappointment, but Enthrone is just what everyone claims it to be, an album of epic proportions. Extravagently beautiful in their use of keyboard passages, Dimmu Borgir are masters of layering, and when you have a top-rate producer (in this case, Peter T?gtgren) in your corner, the sound will be just perfect. Not a note misplaced in over 55 minutes of glorious music (with some really sick satanic lyrics thrown on top), which is quite a feat in itself. Enthrone also runs the complete black metal spectrum, with mid-paced power (A Succubus in Rapture) to balls-out speed black metal (Master of Disharmony). Drumming is truly phenomenal, sacrificing creativity (which is more displayed in Old Man's Child) for precision and power, with an honorable double kick display. A nicely incorporated sense of melody is brought to the surface by the guitar/keyboard teamings, which are really quite dramatic in spots. There's not much more that I can add to the thousands of other reviews lauding this opus except to say: believe the hype, this one's for real.