Released: Out Now

Released By: Season of Mist

Genre: Black Metal

Line-up
Sakis Tolis: Guitar/Vocals
George Emmanuel: Guitars
Van Ace: Bass
Themis Tolis: -Drums

Track List:
01. In Nomine Dei Nostri
02. Ze Nigmar
03. Elthe Kyrie
04. Apage Satana
05. Les Litanies De Satan (Fleurs de mal)
06. For A Voice Like Thunder
07. Komx Om Pax
08. Devadevam
09. Tou Thanatou
10. The Four Horsemen

In the name of Satan, The Ruler of the earth, the King of the World, I command the Forces of darkness to arise from the depths to attend us…

Greece’s black metal legends return with their epic latest album Rituals released through Season of Mist. From the opening track In Nomine Dei Nostri, the album is opened with Greco-Angelo chanting and spoken words to summon the beast. All forces are set on fire from the beginning with this no nonsense approach of pounding blast beat drumming from Themis Tolis and heavy riffs from George Emmanuel on guitar. This opener is one of my favourite tracks on the album and fans of the band will enjoy this incorporated into the bands like performances. Ze Nigmar continues the chanting into Elthe Kyrie where a news report is screamed by a scared female presenter.

The fifth track Les Litanies De Satan (Fleurs du mal) is sung in French and is an Ode to Satan where singer and guitarist Sakis Tolis sings about Satan taking pity on his misery and the wisest, most beautiful angel who is the prince of exile. The track Tou Thanatou stands out as a song written and sung in Greek about death and sending a curse from what I have gathered. There is a great guitar solo in this song and it is a very fast filler to split up the album from the more diverse atmospheric chanting tracks.

For A Voice Like Thunder, is a song about war and is very cinematic and atmospheric. It begins with the sounds of battle and swords clashing over the men shouting. A spoken word by Sakis Tolis as he narrates a tale of the oppression and war between the nations over the name of God, he questions who can stand ? This is one of my favourite tracks on the album as it is a lot slower than the other Rotting Christ songs with great power chord riffs and jumping bass lines from Van Ace. The track is reminded me a bit of a cross between Grand Magus and Amon Amarth but with Rotting Christs twist on the theme, it was very different than what I expected and sounded more like a soundtrack to a pagan film.

With tracks like Devadevam bringing the album near a close, it is clear why they called this album Rituals. Each track is sung in different languages and is an unholy ritual. Devadevam is chanted in Hindi and reminded me of Om with the sound of the sitar and repetitive esoteric lyrics. The production on the album overall is superb and it has a really well mastered modern sound. The album also features an epic cover of The Four Horsemen by Aphrodite’s Child.

Overall this is one of my favourite releases of 2016 that I have listened to so far. It is very well produced and fans of Rotting Christ will not be let down.

Written by David Bell