It is a desolated wasteland where frigid winds nip at lifeless cadavers. Time has forgotten the grotesque remains; they sit forever frozen beyond memory's reach. There is no hope here, only the lost. The grocery store's freezer section is quite the foreboding display. Sometimes I like to listen to music while I'm out and about doing stuff. Life needs a soundtrack, you know? What better way to enhance the mundane like travelling or sweating out a bowel movement than by adding some tunes befitting the situation. A haunting Funeral Doom dirge for quiet nights driving on desolate roads, or some furious Grindcore for that fight your colon is having with those leftovers. If there's one thing that enhances a trip to the old produce aisle, it's a hefty helping of the Devil's rock and/or roll.

Let's get this straight to the point and hit the important parts. This is dark, evil, grim, spooky Black Metal the way the spikey fans enjoy it. It's got the heavy elements we all know and love. The guitar work runs the entire gamut: speedy picking, shredding, riffing, even softer acoustic moments, your choice of poison is sure to come up. There are guttural monstrous vocals that belch forth vitriol; this is also mixed in with moments of ominous chanting like some kind of backwoods coven before burning an effigy with living people inside. The rock solid drumming pounds out the pace of battle well, it's tight and well mixed throughout. Cymbals never felt too loud or intrusive and with so many layers to the music, it was probably for the better. The throbbing open arteries of basslines bleed rhythm throughout this journey into darkness. I found I really enjoyed the variety of music throughout this album; it avoids the folly of not being able to tell where songs end and begin. As much as I like metal, occasionally albums drone on and the entire dozen or so songs sound like one continuous scream/blast beat. Not so the case with this album.

Each song on "Eld" is a unique composition with its own feel and sound. The opening track "Djävulens Eld" starts with a typical Black Metal intro but is abruptly reduced down to just a few notes here and there before being injected with a heavy folk influence. It's a fantastic build to a rich and more epic feel. Another song on the album, "Nihil Sine Morte" is a dreary instrumental piece permeated by melancholy atmosphere. The song "Aska" is as aggressive as any 90's era classic of the genre and it has a killer bassline and some great leads in it as well. The musicianship and composition throughout this album is absolutely top notch. There is so much of what makes extreme music great and I imagine nearly any fan of Black Metal will find something to enjoy (And I know how 'discerning' you all can be).

As I have no idea what Swedish even really sounds like and I'm not some kind of cyborg with google translate wired into my brain, so I had to forgo the luxury of understanding what the subject matter here was. (I guess the tiny phone computer in the pocket is always an option, but research is for nerds) This is such well composed music however, that the feel of the album transcends what may be the subject matter. There's gloom and dread mixed with rage, possibly disgust or malaise. A quick glance at the album cover and band camp hinted at a peek back into "an elder era of superstition and witch hunts" which is definitely better than the "sinister celery and the deli meats of destruction" theme I had thought up on my own. I don't imagine Black Metal was meant to be enjoyed at the supermarket. The misanthropic forest troll banshee hymns don't tend to mix well with checkout lines and discount dairy products but when the music is so engrossing that the world becomes secondary to the tunes blaring through the speakers, it says a lot for the artist's efforts.

Listen to this one in the cereal aisle, listen to it in the frozen food section, the bread cove, the vegetable display, while curled up in a shelf half-full of soup cans, while being escorted out by security. Listen to it on the drive home, at home, after dark, in the morning. Just listen to this album because it's a solid release. This is Black Metal done with obvious respect for the genre. It's not quite as aggressive or epic as say, EMPEROR. It's not quite as folksy and medieval-y like FINNTROLL. It's not quite bacon, it's not quite ham, it's still a tasty morsel of Black Metal goodness you should be putting in yourself.