Valkyrja - The Antagonist's Fire |
Published December 05 2013
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Betrayal Incarnate* |
| Genre | Black Metal |
A.L.
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Vocals
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| Tracks | 7 |
S.W.
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Guitar
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| Running time | 40 Min. |
Thelberg
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Guitar
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| Label | World Terror Committee |
V.P.
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Bass
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| Release | 11 November 2013 |
J. Wallgren
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Drums
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| Country | Sweden |
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Keyboard
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| Producer | Tore Stjerna | ||
| Similar artists | Watain, Dissection | ||
The Antagonist's Fire is the third album from Swedish black metallers Valkyrja, following 2007's The Invocation Of Demise and 2011's Contamination. These previous releases haven't really captured my interest so I was somewhat reluctant to really give this one a shot, but I'm glad I did. The Antagonist's Fire really is a black metal album with very well-constructed songs and a lot of confidence.
The opening riff of Betrayal Incarnate, shortly followed by bombarding drums immediately sets the tone for the album - this is orthodox, relentless black metal with just the right amount of haunting melodies. Black metal is a kind of strange genre today, and it gets reinvented again and again by bands such as Satyricon, Darkthrone, Burzum and Watain. While this occasionally pans out to something really good - and occasionally to something not as good - I'm glad there are bands like Valkyrja out there, showing that every album doesn't have to reinvent the wheel.
A large source of influence seems to be Watain's ground-breaking 2007 album Sworn To The Dark - both regarding the sound and some of the melodies. So I reckon that comparisons between Watain and Valkyrja are inevitable and some people might even disregard Valkyrja as blatant copies. But to be honest, both groups have Dissection to thank for pretty much everything anyway. To me personally, Valkyrja has shown with this album that they are a much more interesting band than the Watain of today, by a mile.
Tore Stjerna, who has produced both the previous albums, has really done a fantastic job with the production of this album. The sound is really crystal clear, showing every nuance, while at the same time being relentlessly brutal and intense. As a side note, he has also produced almost everything Watain has done, so it might not be that strange that the two groups have similar sounds after all.
Apart from Betrayal Incarnate, I find that Madness Redeemer and Eulogy (Poisoned, Ill And Wounded) are the strongest songs of the bunch, with crushing heaviness perfectly synergized with bone-chilling melodies. This is undeniably a fantastic black metal album that shows a lot of maturity from a band that hasn't really stood out to me before. Sadly, I seldom discover new black metal bands - I rather wait for my favourite bands to release new albums - but this album definitely put Valkyrja on my map. It's perhaps not the most original black metal album ever released, but what does that matter when it's this good?
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Performance
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Originality
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Production
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Vocals
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Songwriting
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8 |
6 |
8 |
7 |
8 |
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Summary
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8 chalices of 10 - Bjorn |
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Related links: www.valkyrja.se |
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