Well, strictly speaking, this isn’t a premiere. Due to getting our wires crossed, the album we’re writing about was actually released by Inferna Profundus Records two days ago. But what the hell, it will be a premiere for some of you landing at this page who haven’t yet discovered the album, so we’re forging ahead anyway.
And to be sure, Into the Eternal Satanic Damnation is an album worth discovering. It’s the debut full-length by the Chilean band Sanctum Sathanas, which is principally the project of Magister Nihilifer Vendetta 218 (aka Magus Xem Deitus) from Funeral Fullmoon, Blood For Satan, Faustian Spirit, and Vanagandr, joined for this album by drummer Unholy Tormentor.
You already understand, of course, that the album is a form of wrathful devotion to Lucifer (and indeed “Wrathful Devotion” is the name of the record’s closing track). Yet realizing that will still leave many questions unanswered about how the devotion is expressed and whether it will prove inspirational to listeners — questions answered today.
As for how Sanctum Sathanas express their service to the unlight of the morningstar, they begin with a reverent and mournful organ intro instrumental, and other elements of melancholy do periodically surface elsewhere in the album, but the first full song “Lord Almighty Sathanas” showcases the band’s main line — a kind of firestorming raw black metal that features waves of high searing, delirious sound and pummeling percussion, but with a dynamism of movement and mood that leads the music into grim episodes of dread and desolation.
That first proper song also maneuvers from gale-force blazing and beleaguered moods into rocking beats and sinister, swaggering riffage, as well as a dismal dirge, but one thing doesn’t change — the possessed, ear-broiling vocals, whose reverberating shrieks channel a kind of unhinged fanaticism, even when joined by harrowing roars.
In the tracks that follow, Sanctum Sathanas continue delivering songs that vary considerably in their pacing and in the emotional gradients of the riffing. Change within the songs is a constant. The charismatic, hook-laden riffs are capable of whirling like demon dervishes, wild in their ecstasy, but also thrusting and slashing in manifestations of primitive lust and icy cruelty, or descending into troughs of wrenching agony and solemn mourning. (If you want a prime example of how all those things happen within a single song, check out “Trascendental Fire”.)
The sonic quality of the riffing is indeed raw, dense, and deleterious, though the rapidly trilling and also chime-like leads shine with a contrasting clarity, and the variable drumming, which rocks and canters as often as it rumbles and riots, has an organic “garage band” sound. The reverb-laden shrieks remain absolutely ruinous to sanity at all times.
In a nutshell, Into the Eternal Satanic Damnation is indeed authentically hellish, and steeped in old black metal orthodoxy. It also maintains a strong clawed grip on the listener’s attention because the riffs are so ever-changing and so contagious, and while the drumming isn’t fancy, its variations are well-calculated to mesh effectively with all the guitar maneuvers.
Inferna Profundus is making the album available on black and multi-colored vinyl editions, as well as digitally. Shipping should begin on November 6th.
ORDER:
https://infernaprofundusrecords.bandcamp.com/album/into-the-eternal-satanic-damnation
https://www.ipr666shop.com/