REVIEWS
REVELATION
(REGAIN RECORDS)
Album of the month (April 2007)
That’s it! The album that qualifies LORD BELIAL for the Champions League
of Black Metal! Revelation is a milestone and the best record of the band since
the legendary Enter The Moonlight Gate in my opinion! Maybe the album sounds
so great because of the reason that founding member Niclas Pepa Andersson is
back. Ok, he doesn’t participate at the songwriting this time but he marks
the eleven songs by his characteristic guitar work as you can hear right now.
The mix between cold, sublime melodies and rawness has been done nearly perfect
by the band around vocalist, guitar player and main songwriter Thomas Backelin.
After a short intro LORD BELIAL open a real beast of a Black Metal
album with Ancient Splendor. Of course the three previous releases Nocturnal
Beast, The Seal Of Belial and Angelgrinder have been great records as well.
But Revelation is much better. Just listen to songs like Death As Solution,
Vile Intervention or the brilliant Black Wings Of Death and you will know what
I mean. Supported by a real brutal production, which has been handled by King
Diamond guitar player Andy LaRoque again, LORD BELIAL exterminate every single
Christian who doesn’t hang by the cross after counting until three! Who
loves brutal but melodic Black Metal, can’t ignore a masterpiece like
Revelation! Buy it!!!
Rated 10 out of 10.
Written by Jörn for Noctunal
Hall Magazine
NOCTURNAL BEAST
(REGAIN RECORDS)
Lord Belial innovate and entertain with 'Nocturnal Beast'
Hailing (typically) from Scandinavia, with album covers depicting the usual
dark, tortured and anti-Christian scenes you could be forgiven for presuming
Lord Belial are more of the same typical Black Metal. Oh how wrong you are,
whilst having provided innovation since their classic 'Angel Grinder' album,
Lord Belial have managed to show their potential in unique metal stylings with
their new release 'Nocturnal Beast'. Howled vocals that sound like a camel slowly
dying? Check. Blast beats to make your teeth wobble? Check. Guitars shredding
in the background? Check again. Well guys, this certainly is typical black metal
- but wait a moment - Slower atypical tempos? Melodic clean guitars? A more
thoughtful and interesting song writing style? This is Black Metal guys, but
not as we know it.
It is indeed this mixture of the almost timeless 90s Black Metal stylings with new innovative ideas and almost progressive techniques that makes Lord Belial's music so damning interesting. So many bands revisit the formula that such icons as Mayhem, Darkthrone and Emperor perfected without adding anything new to the plate, making a stagnant and boring sound. Lord Belial however manage to pluck what is most interesting about this sound whilst still providing something new and fresh making them sound both classic and innovative in the same song, the hallmarks of the best sort of band. The mixture of clean melodic guitars with guttural howls and thrashing styles are most prominent on the track 'Nocturnus' and the laid-back whilst also harsh 'Monarchy of Death' which both rank as album highlights alongside the less-inventive but still blasting opener 'Succubi Infernal'. This however is an esoteric release, if Black Metal isn't for everyone then experimental and provoking Black Metal certainly isn't, making this quite a niche release. However for those in the know 'Nocturnal Beast' will provide many juicy little musical nuggets for them to sink their proverbial teeth into, in no small part due to the production on this album. Whilst many Black Metal albums in their attempt to create a harsh and almost lonely sound can end up producing a noise that sounds too distant, too muffled and too far from the ears, this album mixes all the parts with masterly precision meaning the music is always audible whilst still having the dark and harsh qualities that it should be appreciated for.
Overall whilst perhaps not as strong, memorable or defining a release as 'Angel Grinder' and despite the fact it lacks a genuine classic like 'Divide Et Impera' from 'Unholy Crusade', 'Nocturnal Beast' is fittingly a beast of an album and the nine new musical offerings (Sorry guys, Intro and Outro tracks do not count) are all of a high enough quality. If you like your Black Metal harsh and blasting whilst still being thoughtful and engineering then Lord Belial's latest will hold something you'll want to hear!
Rated 11 out of 13
Written by William Southwell-Wright for RoomThirteen
NOCTURNAL BEAST
(REGAIN RECORDS)
Det känns underligt att berömma ett black metal-band
för att de mognat och lugnat ned sig. Men det är precis vad Trollhättegänget
Lord Belial har gjort på de senaste skivorna och de har vunnit mycket
på det. I stället för att försöka göra varje
musikkomponent så extrem som möjligt håller sig senaste verket
"Nocturnal Beast" i ett mellantempo där stämningsskapandet
rankas högre än att försöka slå nytt rekord i höghastighetstrummor.
Det fungerar utmärkt, de små, snygga gitarrslingorna kombinerade
med väl avvägda lugna partier och väsningar till sång ger
skönt kalla kårar längs ryggraden. Låtar som "Nocturnus"
och "Monarchy of death" skulle inte skämmas för sig i en
film av skräckmästaren Dario Argento.
Om fan verkligen blir religiös när han blir gammal återstår
att se, men Lord Belial har bara blivit bättre med åren.
Skriven av Niclas Lindstrand för Dagens Nyheter
http://www.dn.se/DNet/jsp/polopoly.jsp?d=&a=492079&sb1088i0=1_492079
THE SEAL OF BELIAL
(CANDLELIGHT RECORDS)
Back in the mid 1990's, Lord Belial was one of my favorite Black metal bands ever. While "Kiss The Goat" has one of the gayest covers I've ever seen (It's pinkish purple!), the music kicks ass. I also picked up "Enter The Moonlight Gate" and was equally impressed with that. And this C.D. had some of the best artwork and packaging I've ever seen! I guess they had complaints about the first album's cover, and rectified the situation with this album's cover! After that, as what tends to happen, I kind of lost track of the band. I do that a lot, even with bands I love. There's just simply so much out there in the Metal world that I feel I need to have, I neglect a lot of bands. I was going to pick up "Angelgrinder" because there was a lot of buzz surrounding that album when it came out, but alas I never did. Nope, the first time I get to hear any new music from the band again is when I get in their newest album "The Seal Of Belial" to review. And I must say, it's been far too long!
What I immediately noticed about "The Seal Of Belial" is that the music on here is a lot slower, more downtuned, more well thought out, and more precise than their earlier Black Metal rage-a-thons. This album totally crushes their first two albums I've heard, and that's saying a lot taking into consideration how much I liked those albums. "The Seal Of Belial" is mostly a mid-tempo Black Metal affair with some slight Death Metal influences, and even a few Thrash melodies. Some of the melodies are played over and over for quite a few measures, and it becomes almost hypnotizing at times. Yeah, you will find it hard not to bang your head along with the music contained within this disc. The time changes and the new melodies they come up with for each time change are to die for! Each and every musician is a master at their respective instruments, especially the drummer who sounds almost like a frigging machine pounding away at the drums! The album has this overall Dissection-like technicality that I just can't get enough of. Hell, there's even a few acoustic guitar breaks put in at just the right moments that gives the music just that much more of an awe factor.
The lyrics I can't comment on as they were not included with the promo, but judging from the song titles, I'd venture a guess that they were Satanic/anti-religion in nature. The vocalist uses a mid-ranged Black Metal vocal style that I find most excellent. He is neither too over the top nor too subdued and mellow, which is exactly how I like Blackened vocals. The quality of the sound on "The Seal Of Belial" is a huge leap forward compared to their first two albums that I'm familiar with. I guess that can only be expected though as those albums are ten years old. Not only that, the album was produced by Andy LaRoque, so you know it's going to have a great sound before you even put it in your C.D. player.
The packaging, artwork and layout is... well, non existent. None of this was provided with by the label, so I cannot comment on any of it. There isn't even a band member list anywhere to be found, so I couldn't give the members of the band official credit when I talked about the music above. There was a blurry and out of focus black and white image of the cover art on the promo sheet that was sent, but I couldn't really make heads nor tales of what it was. I went to the band's website and took a gander at the cover art there, and it's quite impressive. Some evil Satanic scene set in a forest somewhere, which looked cool. Also, I've always loved the Lord Belial logo. It's nice to see they've kept the same one after all these years!
"The Seal Of Belial" is one of, if not the best Black Metal albums I've heard in 2005. I'm not much of a fan of ubber raw and low-fi Black Metal, and I'm not much of a fan of Black Metal that is too clean sounding. Lord Belial managed to release an album that falls in between those two styles that really appeals to me. It seems Lord Belial was one of my favorite bands back in the day, and they seem to be kicking just as much ass today. Now I need to go and right my wrongs by picking up their last few albums that I've let slip by me.
Review By: Britton Dicks for http://www.metalcoven.com
THE SEAL OF BELIAL
(REGAIN)
THE WAY ALL BLACK METAL SHOULD BE!
KKKK
THE LOWDOWN: Since the demise of Emperor, fans of symphonic, super-proficient
black metal that doesn’t wuss out with keyboards or gothic meanderings
have had a hard time of it. Fortunately, the thoroughly evil Swedish quartet
Lord Belial have delivered some seriously excellent blasphemy on their fifth
full album, The Seal Of Belial. There’s deep, expansive atmospheres all
over epic tracks such as ‘Abysmal Hate’, with intricate, spiralling
riffing that is almost intimidatingly demonic – but never fear, if raw
aggression is your thing, it’s around every corner. While LB will have
a hard time equalling the fearsome majesty of Emperor, they’re one of
the few bands that can come close.
BEST TRACK: ‘Armageddon Revelation’
Reviewed by JOEL McIVER [www.joelmciver.co.uk] for KERRANG!
THE SEAL OF BELIAL
(REGAIN)
Sometimes things take time to be done properly. Lord Belial recorded their new
album in late 2003 at Los Angered Recording studios and did the mixing between
Monday 12th to Thursday 15th of January 2004. Remember today what is the date
? The album was first scheduled to be released on June 21, but due to Anders
Backelin's surgery and related complications, the band preferred to let him
recover and therefore cancelled what was planned before the summer. The new
album The Seal Of Belial has now been released on August 30th, which is almost
one full year after they began the recording process. When I tell you that things
may take time...
I bought Lord Belial's Enter The Moonlight Gate which was their sophomore album, but honestly I had to dig the dust out of it as I haven't listened to it since... well it might be since the year of its release in 1997, or maybe once in 1998. The band has since released a couple of albums, Unholy Crusade in 1999 and Angelgrinder in 2002. The Seal Of Belial has little in common with their second album as it was a true black metal assault in the veins of Dark Funeral, although some of the tracks were filled with melodic passages, and more particularly the song Lamia which is probably what best can be done in melodic black metal. The band has slowed things down over the years to mid tempo and nowadays concentrates more on the feelings and on the atmosphere of their melodic black metal rather than on pure brutality and hysteria. The band probably aimed to be more attractive to a wider audience with this piece of heavy metal with black metal vocals. I doubt they might really succeed although they might grab a couple of Cradle of Borgir's followers if those are fortunate enough to put a hand on a sample. Lord Belial's material is definitely melodic, filled with atmospheres and moods and the description of black metal alone really doesn't match the style of the band anymore. Do you still call Immortal's Sons Of Northern Darkness straightforward black metal ? The Seal Of Belial is a solid mix of epic riffs and evocative rhythms, filled with majestic melodies, as well as first class top notch guitar soloing, although the songwriting might not be the most creative thing around and somewhat too generic.
I hate to say so, but this is definite top notch for those
not too narrow-minded to criticize without even bothering listening to. It is
way over your average black metal releases and I really dig this mid tempoed
heavy black metal stuff.
Killing Songs : Son Of Belial, Legio Inferi, Mark Of The Beast, Scythe Of Death.
Points: 90/100 Album of the month September 2004.
Reviewed by Jack for [ http://www.metalreviews.com ]
ANGELGRINDER
(NO FASHION REC)
Bevarar arvet väl
Lord Belial spar inte på läbbigheterna. Närmaste
slakthus tömdes på diverse köttben och knotor inför fotosessionen
som formligen badar i grisblod. Allt för att späda på imagen
som till stora delar består av att få fansen till att konvertera
till Lucifers texter.
Uppdraget och missionen må vara i magstarkaste laget men bortsett från de helvetiska bilder som bandet målar upp så återfinns några saftiga godbitar i form av "Burn the kingdom of Christ", "Ungodly passage" och "Angelgrider". Alla innehåller nog med blastbeats och terrorpartier för att fylla dagskvoten. De smutsiga, och ibland primitiva, hörnstenarna hos Lord Belials låtar är trovärdiga fundament som tillsammans med deras ilska bevisar att gruppen är etthundra procent black metal ända ut i nitspetsarna.
Topparna på "Angelgrinder" står stadigt
medan resten av plattan inte har en chans mot den kolossala ljudbild som t ex
Immortal och Dark Funeral besitter. Men innerst inne i märgbenet känns
det inte som att Lord Belial strävar efter tungviktstiteln utan satsar
mer på att behålla den primitiva delen i musiken. Och det är
ju ett sundhetstecken om något då genren innehåller fler clowner
än Cirkus Scott. Att bevara ett arv är nog så viktigt som att
skrämma skiten ur kristendomens anhängare.
Reviewed by Jonathan Strandlund
2002-05-02 for Musiklandet
LIVE REVIEWS
Live 2005-02-06 @ 't Beest, Goes [NL] "Purify The Lowlands mini-tour"
Time for the first foreign band on the bill, Lord Belial. Great mid-tempo black
metal fulfilled with hate and anger was spread into ‘t Beest with a main
role for the heavy driving guitars and great powerful drums with some thundering
double bass. The vocals were cold and shivering The band was able to create
a very heavy, still dark atmosphere. They understood you don’t have to
play on full speed to create evilness. During the gig more and more people got
carried away by their sound and in the end every present visitor was banging
their heads of. Only negative point goes out to the people that stayed home
or went home after the gigs from the two earlier bands. You really missed something!
http://www.musketeerofdeath.nl