releasing this week: Behemoth

Behemoth: I Loved You at Your Darkest

Metal Blade Records; 5 October 2018

Musically, Behemoth has found a comfortable balance between extreme metal and allowing the music to breathe. Decades of experience (the first demo is from 1992) has taught them to simplify the music (less crowded vocals, less effects; songs sound less busy than ever before) and develop the melodies a lot more and embellish the symphonic elements to fill out the background. The music is black metal, it is extreme metal, while sounding the most friendly to the ear than ever. It is a very nice achievement. All that touring has taught them a lot about what works and what doesn’t. They are no longer trying to be the fastest, most frenetic band in the world. It is quite an experience to hear Behemoth taking in the lessons in songwriting. This is their most mature album and their most accessible.

Some people have observed that the band’s ever more theatrical shock rock imagery and sexism (clothed as lyrical antireligious rebellion) is gimmicky. Of course, rock and roll was built on the capitalist marketing strategy of shocking people, so this is not exclusive to Behemoth. If you accept that Behemoth keeps changing musically, and you can get past the occult imagery, then it is very likely that this might be seen as the band’s best, most enjoyable, listenable and melodic album. The album is done very, very well. facebook.com/behemoth