15 years later Beherit have returned to the dying art of black metal with the release of Engram.  While it is reminiscent of Drawing Down The Moon in some ways, it is a very different release overall. The electronic influences come more in structure than instrumentation and aesthetic, although they certainly do make use of electronic sounds on most of the songs (usually in the form of keyboards but there is some other stuff in there too). At the heart of it this is easily one of the most straight-forward and well written black metal albums to come out in a long time.

Unlike their earlier works, which were composed in a mostly primitive style of crushing black metal, this album is filled with riffs that wouldn’t sound out of place on an early Bathory album, albeit with more of a modern feel. This certainly has an authenticity to it that “retro” bands lack; this is classic black metal made by guys that grew up listening to and playing this stuff. It’s this awareness of technique and feeling of passion and authenticity that make this album so good. The riffs are fairly simple, but unlike your neighbor’s myspace depressive black metal band they are extremely memorable and even catchy. The album itself has only 7 tracks and is just under 45 minutes, but its evident that a lot of work went into each individual track and it flows so well from the opening riff of the first track to the final breaths of the final, epic (really) and hypnotic track “Demon Advance”.

Song structure is also simple but very well done. In a time when most metal bands seem hellbent on filling a song with as many riffs/breakdowns/intervals/funny noises as possible but just can’t seem to make any of it interesting, Beherit knows how to change up their songs enough to keep things constantly exciting throughout the entire album while still making each individual song memorable and coherent.

If I wasn’t being clear enough with the review I’ll leave it at this. This album rules. Chances are it won’t sell too many copies because most people are too busy downloading Death Magnetic or some other uninspired and soon to be forgotten metal album, but if you are going to buy one metal album this year, even if you’re not particularly into black metal, it should be Engram. People who like metal that is straightforward and near to perfection will love it.

As a de facto metalhead (I don’t care for the term, personally, but that’s what I qualify as), I don’t know where I fall.  The elitist metalhead in me only likes 5 bands.  The old-school metal elitist in me doesn’t like anything that’s come out since the mid-90s.  The don’t-give-a-fuck metalhead in me just wants to bang his head to anything that rocks.  The part of me that isn’t a metalhead at all just likes what sounds cool.

I’ve listened to this album probably a hundred times and I don’t know what it is or why I like it, but I like it quite a bit.  Where ever you look you’re bound to see Sigh referred to as a black metal band, and while their first album or two might have been (I don’t know; I haven’t listened to them), Imaginary Sonicscape is not a black metal album.  The raspy vocals are the only thing reminiscent of black metal at all, and even then, not really.  This is definitely avant-garde metal, and since none of the metalheads within me like avant-garde I don’t know why I like it.

I think I like it because there are some very memorable (when I say memorable I probably mean catchy—very catchy) parts and the album is interesting pretty much all of the way through.  The very first riff on “Corpsecry – Angelfall” might be one of the most memorable things on this disc, and also one of my favorites.  I’ve also been trying to figure out for a year if “Impromptu (Allegro Maestoso)” was written/played by a member of the band/someone they know or if it’s a piece of classical music I’m unfamiliar with because I like it so much (it’s just someone playing a piano).  And obviously, as someone who digs long songs (as long as they’re done right), “Slaughtergarden Suite,” which clocks in at almost 11 minutes, really, uh… I don’t know… keeps me interested?  Like many long, prog-oriented songs, it’s starts out slow and progresses into something faster and more interesting.  Except it’s weird, because this whole album is weird.  And good.

Again, this is a content-less, useless review.  Musically this thing is all over the place.  There are nice orchestral-sounding string sections sandwiched between beeps that I swear toy spaceguns I had when I was a kid made, which would make sense because in other reviews and descriptions of Sonicscape I’ve read many of these sounds called “spacey,” and I don’t know of any other way to describe them, so that’s how it is.  Three quarters of the way through the very first track on the album it just stops abruptly and changes into something else.  There is heavy use of, um… sound on this album, but the “conventional” metal aspects are pretty cool too—some neato leads, cool riffs, etc.  As alluded to above, calling this album a prog album is actually relatively fitting, as weird as it seems for me to say.  I’ve never bothered to listen to the lyrics much, nor have I read them, but I’m sure they’re weird.  I don’t think Sigh is offering up any revolutionary or visionary metal, but it’s kind of cool to listen to once in a while.

Grindcore usually fits convieniently into a few categories.  The old stuff was usually highly politicized, and almost everything else is either gross-out gore/porn/both oriented or based upon everything that is inane.  Exit is an angry tirade against the modern world in non-politcal terms.  It’s not anti-war, anti-racism, or anti–anything else Napalm Death wrote about—it’s just about how much your life sucks and how much you hate it.  Being that punk is usually more politically or socially driven, and that metal (well, the best of it at least) is philosophical or symbolic, this is the perfect topic for a grindcore album, in my opinion: it’s neither political or deeply philosophical, just plain angry and aggressive.

Beyond that I’m not sure what else to say about this album.  It’s heavy and fast, but doesn’t fall in with many other grindcore bands in completely sucking because their stripped-down simplicity isn’t enough to enjoy.  Listening to Exit gets me excited every time; it’s really hard to keep still, very easy to air-blast along or just twitch my leg(s) wildly.  It makes me want to run in circles more than it makes me want to kill myself, so it’s got that going for it.

Recommended if: you’re a hater, crusty, anarcho punk, grinder, metalhead, middle-aged office worker, you work at a suicide hotline, you like running around in circles, or if you like albums that clock in at under a half hour that aren’t completely retarded.

Using this album as an example, Incantation is a perfect name for this band.  I used to listen to it while driving and didn’t find it particularly interesting, but when sitting idly around the house or (I kid you not) before I go to sleep, it puts me in a trance-like state.  It’s heavy, without a doubt, pretty percussive, but not as “brutal” as other bands from the locale and time, such as Suffocation.  (Incantation and Immolation are quite similar, though, and one of my metal-listening friends thought this was Immolation several times.)  I’ve read that some think there is a doom metal quality to Incantation’s music, and while I don’t think that says much in terms of what it sounds like, I don’t disagree.  The slow parts are definitely not doom metal–slow, but this isn’t a (constant) mile-a-minute blastathon either.

In fact, this is the kind of music one should think of when they think of death metal.  I can imagine this as the soundtrack to Hell, making this exactly the music your parents raised you to avoid.  The slight melodic qualities of this album and the use of many different tempos create sections that are very memorable—sometimes I’ll have just a few riffs stuck in my head for an entire day until I can play it to ease my mind.  The riffing is good, too: technical and interesting without going into “riff salad” territory.  The vocals are low, but not indecipherable.  To some the song titles and lyrics might be a little cheese, but they’re part of what make this definitive Hell music as far as I’m concerned.  It’s the tale of expanding the borders of Hell.

I wouldn’t say Diabolical Conquest offers up anything groundbreaking or even spectacular, but it stays true to form and with it Incantation stay true to their name.  If you don’t like death metal you might not like this album because it is death metal, but it’s possible you might due to what I find to be an interesting take on the genre.  Songs vary from pretty straight-forward 3-5 minute evil chants, a 2 minute, calm interlude in the middle titled “Unheavenly Skies,” and an almost 17 minute journey that displays everything this album is capable of at the end.

Recommended if: you like other NYDM bands, are a casual death metal listener, into the occult, or you want to make your religious parents schedule an exorcism because they think you’re conducting a seance.