review by: Roberto Martinelli

The title to this black metal (as if you hadn't guessed already) album is actually longer if you include the fine print that reads "A Dedication Monument." And that's really what this godly disc is all about: paying tribute to the champions of black metal.

The songs on Black Metal ist Krieg are made up of covers of early and more obscure black metal bands such as Root (Zjeveni's "Pisen Pro Satana"), Azhubham Haani ("Far Beyond the Stars"), Lord Foul ("I Burn for You"), Moonblood ("The Gates of Eternity"), as well as original compositions. It's a little tough for someone like me to clearly figure out what is what as the whole (gorgeous) booklet is in German and all I know how to say is bratwurst and guten morgan.

One-man band Kanwulf (along with a couple of inhuman session drummers) reproduce on each track the respective styles that have endeared fans to the sounds of raw, dirty, ugly black metal. For example, the album starts off with an Abruptum meets Burzum ambient track with excruciating shrieks before ripping into the Darkthrone-on-speed title track with the malevolent anger that only black metal can deliver.

A couple of tracks later, the listener is presented with "Seven Tears are Flowing to the River," a 14-minute epic in the style of Judas Iscariot. While there may practically be only two riffs to the whole thing, the repetitive, melancholic melodies are quite moving, thus making this song one of the highlights of the whole album. There'll be a few more on this disc that totals 70 minutes, like the black metal/rock track "I Burn for You," and "The Day Burzum Killed Mayhem," which includes two actual press audio bytes in Norwegian detailing the murder of Oystein "Euronymous" Aarseth by Varg Vikernes.

Track nine, "Erik, May You Rape the Angels," is Kanwulf's homage to Immortal. In case you didn't catch on to that from the riff that is directly lifted from Pure Holocaust's "The Sun Never Rises," there's a little clip at the end from what I guess is a concert in which Immortal doom brothers Demonaz and Abbath are introduced. This is as true and basic as black metal gets: guitar, bass, drums, vocals. No keys.

And while most of the material is misanthropic and aggressive, there is some room for simple beauty, like on track eight, "Amarok - Zorn des Lammes III," which starts off with lapping waves and a woman singing before Kanwulf's ungodly vocals take over. Speaking of which, the man's voice on this album may be up there with the likes of Garm, Abbath and Nocturno Culto as the best black metal vocals ever. The voice is so raw and powerful as Kanwulf rasps away in a dry throat, I swear you can hear each individual nodule in the man's trachea scrape. A friend of mine described the vocals as being "simultaneously cutting himself and gargling broken glass while being on fire." That sounds pretty right on.

Like true black metal art, Black Metal ist Krieg is presented to the listener in the same way as Robert DuChamp presented the viewer with his work. But instead of a bicycle seat glued to a stool, Nargaroth take a big hunk of jagged, bloody meat and splatch it unceremoniously in front of you as it quivers and bleeds. The music, like the meat, just sits there, daring you to make something of it and not caring if you can't. That's what the songs on Black Metal ist Krieg are: ugly, brutal, raw, real. I haven't heard Tsjuder yet, but I dare say you wont find an album as black metal as this in 2001. Totally essential and my pick for black metal album of the year.