Introduction
Darkthrone align with no one. Defiantly heavy metal, but with little interest in the myriad sub-genre tags that now blot the landscape, the band just are, with each new album feeling like an intimate love letter to the scene that spawned them. Eternal Hails is the band’s eighteenth album and, as we have come to expect, it could be no one but Darkthrone. Darker and doomier than its predecessor (2019’s impressive Old Star), Eternal Hails features just five tracks over the course of its forty-six-odd minutes, with even the shortest track clocking in at over seven minutes. Recorded outside of the band’s own Necrohell studios (at Chaka Khan Studio in Oslo), Eternal Hails offers up a densely claustrophobic sound that perfectly suits the band’s gruelling epics, and it’s amazing how quickly the album appears to pass, despite the length of the tracks.
The Box Set
For all that the band eschew the trappings of commercialism, Darkthrone still love great physical product. From the clamshell-clad special edition of Preparing For War through the exhaustive Black, Death And Beyond, Darkthrone love boxsets and, because they’re fans themselves, they include items of real value. The special edition of Eternal Hails is no exception. Packaged in a rigid, 12×12 box (with glossy art), the album is pressed onto gorgeous, heavyweight purple vinyl with sleeve and insert. The album is also present on CD (in digipack) and cassette (black, of course), just in case you need it across such a ludicrous array of formats. There’s also a reproduced hand-written note from the ever-amiable Fenriz, a mini book detailing the album’s creation (written by engaging uber-fan Nick Ruskell) and a rather nice art print, with which you can darken your walls. All in all, it’s a comprehensive package that could only possibly be bettered by the inclusion of additional music.
The Music
With an ominous production that could, nevertheless, grate a certain curdled dairy product, His Master’s Voice (opening Side A) is reassuringly raw, offering up a dark, predominantly mid-tempo number that sits somewhere between Sabbath-esque doom and early Venom’s unhinged proto-thrash. With the drums defiantly high in the mix (albeit largely shorn of their higher frequencies), the sound is dense, oppressive even; and, from the track’s heart, comes Nocturno Culto’s ravaged rasp, inviting you ever deeper into the maelstrom. In contrast, Hate Cloak has a vintage Maiden vibe (think Piece Of Mind) that is surprisingly catchy. Like Maiden, Darkthrone take great delight in shifting gears at the drop of a hat, edging from trad-metal into doom and back again, and Hate Cloak offers up a mix of great solos and engaging riffs (the former emphasising the strength of the production here). The first side concludes with the blackened gallop of Wake Of The Awakened, an ambitious and multifaceted piece that recalls the epic intent of Snowfall.
Opening Side B with the funereal Voyage To A North Pole Adrift, Darkthrone carve out a slab of malevolent doom that feels like Candlemass, albeit shorn of that band’s gothic melodrama. As with Hate Cloak, the track wends and weaves its way across a heavy metal landscape, and the faster paced riffs that pepper the heart of the song are delivered with potent force. It’s a mark of Darkthrone’s ability to ensnare the listener that the track flies past despite being nearly ten-minutes in length and it’s another piece that manages to wedge itself into your sub-conscience, seemingly despite the blistering production. Given the quality of the material to this point, it may come as some surprise to learn that Darkthrone saved the best for last, and yet the mid-tempo churn of Lost Arcane City Of Uppakra proves to be the album’s catchiest track. It’s ridiculous just how much it manages to insert itself beneath the skin, but the glee with which Nocturno Cultuo peels out gargantuan riffs is both unmistakable and infectious. With the track drawing to its end, the band throw in one last sonic curve ball, adding an eerie Moog passage into the mix. It brings the album to a close on an unexpectedly cinematic note that is both atmospheric and poignant, and it leaves the listener wondering as to where the preceding forty-odd minutes have vanished.
Final Thought
Eternal Hails is everything you have come to expect from a Darktrhone album. Utterly uninterested in the myriad fads that have come and gone during their thirty-four-year reign of terror, Darkthrone remain Heavy Metal’s most loyal fans, and their passion for the form comes through in every crushing beat and every nervy riff. With a more obvious doom influence than on previous efforts, Eternal Hails also benefits from the band having stepped out from the comfort of their own studio, and the result is an album that is impressive even when judged against a back catalogue that is remarkably consistent in terms of quality. Put simply, if you love metal, you love Darkthrone, and you need this record in your life. 9/10
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