Adorned with suitably oblique artwork, Transcend Into Oblivion is the darkly sinister new album from American black metal alchemists Necrofier. Formed in 2018, these Texan metallers have built a formidable career for themselves and here the band follow up 2023’s Burning Shadows in the Southern Night with a work of immense depth and scope. With three gargantuan, thematically linked suites, woven together with three instrumental pieces, it is a labour of love that marks the band out as
The album opens with a three-part, twenty-minute epic titled Fires Of The Apocalypse Light My Path. With its icy riffs, Part I sets the scene, the band inhabiting similar frozen landscapes to the likes of Emperor and Mayhem. However, while the guitars are gloriously discordant, there is a depth to the bass and drums that gives Necrofier their own feel, for all that the vocals seem to be screaming out of the void, and it’s hard not to feel that instinctive rush of adrenalin as a mid-tempo riff kicks in to drive the piece forward towards an eerie, and rather beautiful, conclusion played on the violin. Thunderous drums open the gateway to Part II, a darkly symphonic piece backed by blasphemous choirs and possessed of an eerie atmosphere pitched somewhere between Therion, Cradle of Filth, and early Dimmu. It’s brilliantly arranged and played with a dark passion that draws the listener in. It then falls to Part III to wrap up the early stages of the album, the band introducing a dark carnival atmosphere into the proceedings.
That carnival atmosphere gives way to pure horror on Behold, The Birth Of Ascension a short piece comprising a simple piano refrain as a child screams and footsteps echo across a cold, nursery floor. A piece that’s all the more harrowing for its understated horror, it paves the way for the unstoppable Servants Of Darkness, Guide My Way. With Part I a churning, none-more brutal blackened death metal masterpiece, it nods to Behemoth circa Zos Kia Cultus and it is absolutely epic. No less impressive is Part II, which keeps the weight of its predecessor, but adds choral elements and splenetic lead guitar, all of which only serves to heighten the sense of atmosphere the band have so effectively built up. And yet Necrofier are not done with the surprises, for an acoustic passage, utterly sublime in its simple sincerity, paves the way for the haunted hallways of Part III. Doom laden and slower than anything that has come before, Part III slithers into view as huge slabs of guitar grind their way into the listener’s conscious. The pace picks up, of course, but the overall feeling is of being slowly suffocated in a cloud of unyielding darkness.
Following another short segue titled Mystical Creation Of Enlightenment, Necrofier unleash the manic Horns Of Destruction, Lift My Blade. Part I provides the cacophonous opening. An outpouring of black metal savagery, it leaves the listener somewhat shellshocked and Part II, which is no less brutal, does little to untangle your frayed nerve endings. It leaves Part III to wrap things up on a more dynamic note, the guitars surging toward the beat with a rhythm that evokes galley slaves at the oars, the rasping vocals always exhorting greater exertions.
It leaves one final piece, Toward The Necrofier, to conclude this dense, multi-faceted album with rumbling percussion, subtle guitar work, and that same cinematic sense of atmosphere that defines the album no matter how ferocious it gets.
Necrofier are clearly aware of black metal’s sonic heritage. Over the course of this remarkable album, they reference any number of acts, from Darkthrone and Dimmu Borgir to Emperor and Behemoth, drawing the threads together to create an epic, sweeping statement that is all their own. Here there is darkness, danger, beauty, and death, all given life by a production that is raw and authentic yet deep and powerful. It is a deeply impressive and ambitious work, marking Necrofier out as serious contenders in the dark world of extreme metal. 9/10
