Artist: Azaghal
Country: Finland
Label: Avantgarde Music
Formats: CD
Year: 2022
Finnish black metal kings of releases Azaghal return with their sixth album in just over ten years “Luciferin Valo” (which is something like their 22nd release in total). It might be clear that I have missed a few releases over the years but over all this band, which is one of the oldest still active Finnish black metal hordes of today, delivers a certain kind of quality black metal.
And this album is nothing different from the rest in that respect, quality black metal, but on the other hand it is very standard and actually nothing shocking at all. Tracks like “Tuhoaja” and “Verta Ja Tuhkaa” for instance have that same old mid-era Darkthrone/Celtic Frost vibe in it. Done pretty well, but it sounds a bit soulless as well. And that is exactly what black metal needs to have to survive the endless flooding of (underground) black metal releases: a soul, an identity and a true atmosphere. The info that came with my promotional copy says this is typical Fnnish black metal, or literally they say this is black metal with a “true-Finnish-trademark”, which seems a little of a misunderstanding as certainly not all Finnish black metal is this non committal – on the contrary, Finland contributed quite some essential bands and albums to the development of black metal as a genre with the likes of Beherit, Impaled Nazarene and Barathrum.
It would be very hard to deny the pressence of some worthy black metal moments, but it would be even harder to proove this album to be essential or even very interesting. Let’s say this one if only for die-hard black metal collectors and Azaghal fans. In these times of quality scarceness in the black metal scene it might be worth your money if you’re searching for albums to spend your money on, yet I would wait for a better chance. Enjoyable but hardly essential.
