Here’s another classic of the Black Metal genre, Impaled Nazarene Tol Compt Norz Norz Norz (which translated means “All numbered 666”) was released by the Finnish group in 1993. By this time black metal was already established and genre leaders like Mayhem and Burzum ruled the scene so for something else to come along and get noticed it had to stand out from the crowd. And this certainly did. It had black metal extremity but was also rather well produced and musically this was really tight. Impaled Nazarene managed to combine Black Metal with grind and death metal in a quite superior way which allowed them to rise to the top of the Finnish scene, even charting in the mainstream charts.
The album itself starts off with a creepy demonic voice similar to many before them, but kicks in with some unholy black metal played fast and precise and sounding really clear. Musically this reminded me of Repulsion or Napalm Death but played much cleaner. The black metal vocals laid over the top really give this a unique feel. As is pretty obvious from the bands name the lyrics are focused on Satanism and the music is played rather hatefully so everything sounds and feels coherent with the way the band presents themselves. The drumming is rather extreme, and also very precise which tends to give the music a bit of a mechanical feel, but again for this album it works perfectly. There’s a few samples between the song which break things up a little but really this album is full of excellent extreme metal riffage and goes from fast to slow and everything in between. I also have to say the use of keyboards in the songs is refreshing (not just used for inbetween songs or interludes)
Overall I really like this album and still go back to listen to it every now and then. It’s an impressive album and even more so considering it’s their first. If you are fan of extreme metal and haven’t heard the guys before, I really recommend giving this one a listen!
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