After the noble coming with the EPs "Morbid Tales" and "Emperors Return", the wonderful and classic "To Mega Therion" and the revolutionary "Into the Pandemonium", CELTIC FROST did what no one could think: a Glam Metal album called "Cold Lake" (that is terrible, even for Big Daddy here, who loves Glam Metal). The future seemed dark for the quartet, and then, they come to "Vanity/Nemesis", their final album before going into a hiatus of some years. What is "Vanity/Nemesis" up to?

To be honest, it lacks of the same musical inspiration of the past, and the band is just playing like they seemed to be forced to do so. It's a kind of Thrash Metal/traditional Heavy Metal orientated sound, far distant from what they did. It's melodic and even introspective, but forced and sounding not like CELTIC FROST. The problem of the album is not on the production. Roli Mosimann, along with Brian Martin (mixing) and Howie Weinberg (mastering) did a very good work, and the sound quality of the album is truly good, heavy and clean as the band needed to be. The instrumental tunes of guitars, bass guitar and drums are fine, and the cover seems to be reflecting the moment of the band: fractured and broken.

If you read the technical notes of "Vanity/Nemesis", it will be clear that the changes on the line-up (and maybe the lack of commercial success) made the band search for a new musical genre. But this one didn't fit. There are some good songs, as "The Heart Beneath", the heavy weight of the rhythmic kitchen on "Wine in My Hand (Third from the Sun)" (where the vocals' tunes are near from the past) and from "The Name of My Bride" (very good guitar riffs), the good version for "This Island Earth" (a Bryan Ferry song), the energy that flows from "Phallic Tantrum", and the slow tempos of "Nemesis" can be the reason for the fans to buy this album. And the bonus songs, the Sabbathic weight on their version for DAVID BOWIE's "Heroes", and the expandable "A Descent to Babylon (Babylon Asleep)" can be a good reason as well. But I still don't have this album on my personal collection, and I'll keep the things this way.

It's just a good album, nothing more than that, if you're a fanatic for CELTIC FROST's name...