Celtic Frost - Monotheist (2006)

After experiencing their Prototype recording earlier in the 21st century, I had no hope that Celtic Frost would ever be returning to the level of artistry and quality that they once reached through their mid-80s albums To Mega Therion and Into the Pandemonium. It had become clear that 'creativity' wasn't an issue, since Warrior was experimenting with industrial/electronics, and even awful hip hop influences, but it felt wholly misguided. Imagine the surprise then, when just a few years later, after a lot of effort and hard work, the Swiss idols would release another heavy album to great praise, with worldwide distribution through Century Media. Arguably, this was the Celtic Frost record fans had been waiting on for nearly 20 years, but its uncompromising, massive sound was also welcoming towards those decades of newer fans who came up on death and black metal, extremities who in part owe their existence to this band's very legacy.

Unfortunately, I feel like the huge production and overwhelming grooves on the album have gone a long way towards its popularity, and less concern seems to be placed upon the actual construction of the riffing or enduring nature of the tracks. Don't mistake me for someone who hates the album, because after a gulf of 10 years, Monotheist was a breath of relief that the band had stopped fucking around. I like it alright, and listen to it once in a great while, but there is no chance in hell that it's quite so great as many would seem to believe. Greatest comeback ever? Work of genius? Absolutely not. Celtic Frost's primal riffing was a boon in the 80s, a clever antithesis to the increasing complexity of the thrash and speed metal scenes, but there in 2006 a lot of the guitar patterns felt irritably derived, and I'm rather surprised that it took Warrior, Ain and their new band mates '4 years of songwriting' to arrive at what a group of 'core kids jamming on the corner of my street could have come up with in 15 minutes in an afternoon session.

Of course, Celtic Frost are more or less cashing in debts on something they had a heavy hand in first creating. A lot of the palm muted chugging that filtered on down through thrash, hardcore and groove metal scenes first originated with bands like this who played them with muscle, and so if Monotheist often reminds me of younger acts that broke out through the 90s, then they're automatically forgiven. Some of the open, groovier low end open note rhythms in tracks like "Ground", "Progeny" or "Ain Elohim" remind me of the first two albums from New Yorkers Life of Agony due to that voluminous guitar tone. More surprising, the whole album reeks of a modern doom metal effort more than any other specific genre. Granted, works like Morbid Tales and To Mega Therion had a huge impact on a lot of the death/doom that originated from England like Paradise Lost and My Dying Bride, almost as much as Sabbath, but this is the first Celtic Frost record that I would classify as predominantly doom, with a hint of their formative, thrashing fervor. Not a bad thing, per se, but it certainly plays into how one experiences the album.

For any who might have worried that Frost had lost its 'worldliness', fear not. Touches of Into the Pandemonium's eclectic nature are retained here, even if they're in the minority. Examples include "Incantation Against", a Mesopotamian inspired guest vocal piece by featuring Simone Vollenweider's gorgeous voice against a brooding, monotonous male choir backdrop. "Os Abysmi Vel Daath" features alternations of crushing, simplistic riffs with some dark noise passages; while "A Dying God Coming Into Human Flesh" opens with brooding, dark clean guitars and desolate crooning by the man himself. There are also a number of guest slots throughout the album like Satyr and Peter Tägtgren lending vocals for the 14 minute slog "Synagoga Satanae", or Ravn from 1349 appearing on "Temple of Depression". Considering how many death and black metal bands pay tribute to Frost on a normal basis, it makes a lot of sense that that various personas would have been lining up to contribute. In general, though, Monotheist is far less dynamically ranged than Into the Pandemonium, perhaps even less than To Mega Therion: as a whole it congeals into a very consistent, depressing experience.

There are two primary suspects holding me back from appreciating this comeback as fully as some of my peers. First: the guitar riffs. I like that they're crude and loud, almost as if Warrior was reaching back into the primordial ooze from which he first shaped Hellhammer for a new strain of pummeling slime to unleash upon his followers. But the actual patterns of notes are so often treacherously dull and uninspired, 'first thing that came to mind' progressions that might thrill people attuned solely to the leaden distortion and Franco Sesca's concrete foundation, but seem to lack all the charisma of their old songs. Whereas "Return to the Eve" or "Circle of the Tyrants" have survived for 20+ years in my memory, feeling fresh even today, something like "Ground" or "Obscured" is almost impossible for me to recall even a week later. The guitars were such a prominent feature of their classics, but here they might just belong to any other run of the mill doom metal band of Sabbath lineage. They are no way even nearing impressive, and this is a fault I also found with the subsequent Triptykon debut, which has an even more brazen and 'bigger budget' production sound.

Since the guitars don't really stand out other than their tone, they rely all too heavily on the pacing of the beats and the lyrical narrative to fuel the album, and this leads me to my other major complaint against Monotheist: the lyrics very often suck from the same bone that they did with the Prototype demo. Lots of 'I am I am I am I am' which appears in about half the songs on the frickin' album, and far too much repetition of lines like 'Oh God, why have you forsaken me?' ("Ground") or 'I am a dying God, coming into human flesh' (guess the track), 'I deny my own desire' ("Os Abysmi Vel Daath"), etc. I realize that the actual purpose behind the lyrics is to provide a dark, hypnotic and tormented mantra alongside the simplicity of the riffing, but with so little to enjoy in the guitars themselves, I found that the lyric patterns and choruses seemed lazy and forgettable, as if partially inspired by a lot of miserable groove and nu-metal acts throughout the 90s who had the poetic eloquence of a manhole cover. It's not that what is being said is not 'important', but it's just not being said by the most interesting means.

Tom, on the other hand sounds pretty damn good. He had clearly aged, but his gruff bark has lost little power over the years. It even seems a little more daunting and acidic among the concrete chords that carve out "My Domain of Decay". His froglike gutterglam whines circa Cold Lake have been supplanted by a cleaner, wavering Gothic tone which, while not as charismatic as his lines on "Mesmerized" or "Babylon Fell" from Into the Pandemonium, is acceptable enough on a depressive, atmospheric droning cut like "Obscured" (on which he's joined by female vocals to provide what must be the catchiest single passage on the whole of the album). The new rhythm section seems to gel together quite nicely, granted they're not doing so much outside of accenting the guitars, but there's a more tribal nature to Sesa's performance than I can recall from Reed St. Mark or Stephen Priestly. Ain contributes backing vocals and writing, and the new guitarist Erol Unala (who had been with them since Prototype) is a fitting match for Warrior.

In the end, Monotheist overcomes my sizable gripes if only because it still provides an alluring atmosphere in which the listener can drown him or herself for 70 minutes, and has a few aural climaxes scattered about its cratered, sorrow-scarred surface that compensate for its ruddy, often overbearingly and tactless gloom. It's a good example of a cult act adapting itself to a modern environment without losing all of its identity, though as we know it was not exactly the most seamless of transitions (listen to the two prior demos, or the 'glam' phase). The cover image is great not only because it sticks with you, but it also matches the haunted aesthetics of the music. That aside, this is not an album I want to render down to its individual components very often, or I'll become too annoyed with the lackluster architecture of the riffs and the general predictability of the songs as they stray forth into the apocryphal dusk.

Verdict: (Barely a) Win [7/10] (I am no more than a lie)

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Prototype DEMO (2002)

Prototype is both the strangest Celtic Frost recording and what might lamentably represent the biggest identity crisis in their history, but unlike the Nemesis of Power demo 10 years earlier, I can hardly blame it for laziness or lack of trying. Self released with gimmick guitar pedal packaging and brazen album title, it looks nothing like any of the band's backlog. In fact, if not for the Cold Lake icon in the right corner, the 'CF VIII' scrawled across the bass of the pedal, and a few of Tom's vocal lines through the heavier tunes, it would be quite difficult to qualify as a true Celtic Frost release, but more of an extension of Warrior's work in the industrial metal outfit Apollyon Sun in the later 90s. That said, Tom's mainstay was no stranger to experimentation, and so I can't say I was highly surprised when I first heard this. Only that it hadn't arrived sooner.

Protoype has a more sleek, modern production than anything Warrior had written to date, and the substantial track list leads me to believe that it was intended as some 'missing link' full length to fill in the gaps of the band's history. Sadly, though, it's quite thoroughly awful, despite the rather eclectic mix of ingredients. Normally I have no opposite to the inclusion of electronics, or even pop and hip hop elements to a heavier recording if they contribute to some sense of intrigue, compulsion or just some damn catchy songwriting, but here they seem misused as a tired set of cliches, a very 90s-esque 'open mindedness' that seeks to force an exhibition of the band's diversity. At its very best, the demo/album is competent and subtle with its external influences, but at worst it's a dire mockery of all good taste, tragically lame to the point that it takes on a bad, cartoon-like quality...

Let's just say that, from where this demo BEGINS, you have little to no idea how it will END, but we're not talking about unexpected thrills or 'twists' that one might deem pleasurably; rather an air traffic accident that initially seems as if it will cause only minor structural damage to a craft's landing gears but then ends up on the nightly news, hundreds of dead being pulled from the still smoking wreckage. Essentially, the first two tracks are a sort of 'trance' techno, with beats that loop alongside a modicum of glitch electronics, feedback and ominous, crunchy bass against the backdrop. The cyber rendition of the Beatles' "Helter Skelter" is quite interesting, and even if I don't dig how the lyrics grind across the heavily affected guitar samples and beeping noises, it was at least worth a try. "Totgetanzt" is an original, with even sparser, pulsing textures, sinister breath whispers and cheesy keyboard beats, but nothing as interesting as the cover ever occurs.

And then we come to the 'heavy' sequence of the demo, where drudging, muted guitars are affixed to drum machine and samples in a means redolent of Pitch Shifter, or maybe the late 90s Prong material with enhanced electrics. Warrior gets rather aggressive with his vocals on "The Dying I" or the occasional guffaw in "Human Dirt", but elsewhere he uses a sort of nasal, whining vocal that reminds me of Jonathan Davis from Korn. The lyrics are quite miserable through this portion of the track list, with a lot of generic call and response style chorus parts and generic 'what I am what I am what I am' ("Human Dirt") effortless bullshit lyrics that were a heavy symptom of bad 90s alternative rock, industrial, early metal core and groove/nu-metal. The heavily atmospheric electro rock duet "November" features Tom's whimpering alongside a female guest, and "Deep Inside" (one of two Apollyon Sun tracks that wound up here) is a passable trip hop tune with some psychedelic guitar swirl backing the chorus, but even the latter becomes incredibly cheesy when it hits the classical piano bridge with the girl whispers: 'deep inside deep inside'. Oh so sexy, guys! Not.

But, honestly, I'd take ANY OF THIS over what happens at the end of the demo, where it transforms from merely misspent creative energy into an outright abomination, as if a bunch of ICP juggalos decided to stick bananas in their wrestling thongs and then invade the recording session, bribing Tom with drugs to let them in the studio booth. "Get Wicked (dagger and grail edit)" is some weird interlude with a dude rapping in...French, I think? It's bad enough that we must suffer its reckless stupidity, but the guy actually has the audacity to include the phrases 'get down get down' in nearly the same breath as he cries 'procreation of the wicked'. At this point I am well on my way to caving in my face with handgun rounds, but Prototype actually gets WORSE, with the heinous and inane "Hip Hop Jugend", a hybrid of porn electronics, bad German Rammstein rambling, smutty 'ooh baby aah baby' female narrative and a bunch of manly Eurotrash shouts of 'Hip Hop Jugend' in the background.

Seriously, I dare anyone to listen through this song and then tell me again how miserable you think Cold Lake is. If you can make it through without cracking a smile or choking on a combination of laughter (at it, not with it) and vomit, then I certainly owe you a beer. But trust me, it will haunt you forever...the final nail in the coffin of failed ideas that permeate Prototype. As we all know by now, this direction was not one Warrior and Ain pledged to continue, its awkward and unnecessary mutation silently sealed away in vaults of agonizing regret that only a handful were so unfortunate to experience. Monotheist would later steer the band back on track, an acceptable compensation for 10 years of bullshit, but personally I'm not sure it could ever outlive scars like this.

Verdict: Fail [2.5/10]

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Nemesis and Power DEMO (1993)

One might expect an influential, iconic band of Celtic Frost's stature to rough out the 90s with considerable dignity, but if the Nemesis and Power demo, recorded to prod some post-Noise label interest, is any indicator, then the Swiss folded at exactly the right time to avoid humiliating themselves on a level Cold Lake could only have dreamed of. The content of this demo is hands down the most embarrassing and pedestrian songwriting I've ever heard from the band, making their glamorous 1988 faux pas seem glorious by comparison, and Hellhammer seem lucratively sophisticated. Clearly Tom and his troops had run full out of steam, and at best the material here offers a few half-assed special effects that themselves would have required heavy development to pass muster.

Oh, I get that it's a 'demo' recording. I get it, believe me. It was never meant to greet the ears of wriggling and opinionated scum such as myself, but let's be blunt: if the best thing your demo has going for it is a semi-industrial, dorky cover of an obvious Carmina Burana chorus, you're in a serious spot of trouble. I mean, it's not as if Celtic Frost was some heinously unknown garage band. They might have yet to become such cult figures as they are in the 21st century, but even at this point they'd already released a pair of marvelous albums and another pair of classic EPs going back almost a decade before this. Even if they were riding the misfortune of a few dud albums, record label troubles and lineup changes, the songwriting here is uninteresting, dull, and often inexcusably so. This was more or less the same lineup as Vanity/Nemesis, only with the bonus of having Reed St. Mark back on the drums, so for the songs to be THIS bad I can only surmise that: a) they were written in 15 minutes while they were showering and shaving, or b) Tom Warrior was abducted by a thrash band of 13-year olds down the street and forced to add his earnest, froglike voice to their recording. I'll go on and rule out substance abuse, because frankly, this is just not that inspired...

I realize that Celtic Frost was never some bastion of riffing technicality, but their simplified palm mutes and groove rhythms were generally so well conceived that they compensated via their raw barbarity. Here, the guitars seem like the 'my first thrash riff' collection of some insipid teenager with two weeks training, only the kid in question would never have presumed that they might make for decent songs capable of generating interest. "Devil and the Flesh", "The Man Who Would Weep", "Primeval Rapture" and the 'untitled' track, "Under Apollyon's Sun" (which also appeared on the Parched With Thirst Am I and Dying compilation) all contain some of the least impressive muted noted progressions I have heard in my life, to the point that they make the infant nu- and groove-metal acts of this period seem like skilled composers. The drums are pretty simplistic, without much of the blunt force trauma Mark was meting out on the earlier recordings, and the bass is so antagonistically pathetic that it pretty much copies the worthless guitar lines.

There is still an undercurrent of eccentricity here in the choice of female vocals for "Pearl of Love" (which also featured the origin of a Monotheist riff), the strange vocal filter in "Primeval Rapture" which occasionally feels like Mustaine snarling, or the aforementioned industrialized intermission with its chants and choirs and meaty beats, but when rubbed against such a sodden and lamentable collection of riffs as, say "Icons Alive", any sense of fascination and wonder is immediately depleted. And, really, after hearing Into the Pandemonium, how could any of this seem even remotely exotic or avant-garde. Tom's vocals continue to strafe the border between the more aggressive grunts of his past and the febrile whining of Cold Lake, and are not once impressive, but the presence of such treacherously prosaic guitars overshadows any of the agony and regret they might otherwise impose...

I cant chide the band too hard, because obviously they were well cognizant of the fact that this material wasn't going to get them anywhere. Yet the very fact that it exists in even the most amateur, covert form is sad indeed, more evidence of an 80s titan falling to the wayside. At least Celtic Frost didn't attempt to 'keep up with the times' by mutating into an all out alt rock, grunge, rap or techno industrial project, right?

Rig...oh...yeah.

Verdict: Epic Fail [2/10]

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Parched With Thirst Am I and Dying (1992)

Celtic Frost might have dragged their heels in an unwelcome and unwanted glam fetish for a few years, or released a few lacking short form products through their career, but one thing they could never be accused of is ripping off their fan base by capitalizing on such an enormous cult status as they've garnered these past decades. Just how many useless, redundant Best of Celtic Frost compilations might we have suffered it Tom G. Warrior and his backers turned a blind eye to their dignity and quality control and dropped to their knees to fluff the almighty dollar?

It says a lot that, when a fan collection did finally arrive in the form of Parched With Thirst Am I and Dying via Noise Records, that it was so loaded with re-recordings, rare or unreleased tracks, and other odds and ends that don't wind up feeling like a track by track repressing of studio material that they've already turned a buck off. That doesn't make all of its content invigorating, or unique to this one album, but in general this would hold a lot of appeal to an audience of the time who might not have been saturated in the CD re-releases (with bonus tracks). What's more, if you're lucky enough to have gotten the 1999 re-issue of the compilation, it features about 30% more content. This is the version I'm covering here, and the version I'd recommend you hunt down if you're in the market for the odds and ends of your Swiss heroes.

There are, of course, a few cuts here which might have been omitted in favor of other demo reels, live cuts or rarities, most of which are taken straight from the Vanity/Nemesis album: "Wings of Solitude", "The Hearth Beneath", "The Name of My Bride", and a couple oldies in "Circle of the Tyrants" (Morbid Tales) and the French version of "Tristresses de La Lune" which was available on the US release of Into the Pandemonium. All good or amazing choices, but not necessarily relevant to the interests of fans who already owned them. The radio edit of "I Won't Dance (The Elders Orient)" and "Cherry Orchards" are also unwarranted, neither superior or markedly different than their fuller studio incarnations. The raw studio jam of "Return to the Eve" with the added Reed St. Mark vocals is also here, but this too we've heard before on the Tragic Serenades EP or CD re-issue of To Mega Therion; nor do I care about the jam version of "Mexican Radio" much either, or "The Usurper" with Ain's bass that was also already on Tragic Serenades.

But the other half of the compilation is far cooler, or at the very least, it tries to be. For example of the latter: a pair of 1991 re-recordings of tunes from the ill-fated Cold Lake have been included, with a bit more aggression and better vocals. In the case of "Downtown Hanoi", it's not a huge difference since that was one of the heavier tracks on the album to begin with, but for "Juices Like Wine", the verse vocals feel stronger. The chorus is still a bit whiny, and drier than the Cold Lake rendition, but just about everything else might sate fans who hated that. It's nice that they've decided to toss "A Descent to Babylon (Babylon Asleep)" on here from the Wine in My Hand EP (1990), since it removes any and all impetus outside of collection to acquire that piece of crap, but it's still not one of the band's better tracks from the Vanity/Nemesis era.

And lastly, the real 'goodies'! Or, rather, the ones you were really waiting for, even though they don't turn out to be so memorable. "In the Chapel, in the Moonlight" has at last been culled from the rare, limited edition Collector's Celtic Frost vinyl (1987), and while not totally impressive, the grimed out vocals, timpani and the trudge of the riffing place it firmly within the Into the Pandemonium period, though it is nowhere near good enough to have belonged on the full-length. "The Inevitable Factor" and "Journey Into Fear" are both decent tunes, the first with a nice set of grooves and Tom's Gothic grousing; the latter with a primal punk thrust and thrash breakdown circa Morbid Tales or Emperor's Return. "Idols of Chagrin" was a brand new piece made for this album, but I can't say it's a favorite. Lots of more generic rock grooves to the guitar riffs, and though the harsher frog vocals, plodding bass breaks and the guitar tone are all well produced, the riffs are far from standout. "Under Apollyon's Sun" is superior, though the primary guitar line is familiar to others they've written in the past, and the vocals are mediocre.

But at least this last pair I've mentioned give us a hint of how the band's production would have sounded with a theoretical direct followup to Vanity/Nemesis which never manifest, and they are certainly better (sounding) than what they wrote for their Nemesis of Power demo in '92. In the end, I'm not sure that the positives of Parched exceed its mediocre elements. There's a real sense of resolution and completeness here, authored by a band that cared what it was placing on the shelves for its followers to gobble up. Pieces are drawn from all over the canon. But at the same time, there are enough redundancies to drag its value down, and there's not a single track of the unreleased rarities here that deserved to be on one of the Frost full-lengths. It makes perfect sense that they'd end up here, but just because they're novel to the devoted listener does not render them into works of appreciable quality.

The new songs were, truthfully, underwhelming. Boring even. Engineering aside, if they had released a full length with such lackluster composition it would have flopped even harder than Cold Lake. They're just not memorable, an attribute critical to all of their classics. The other rarities are a mixed bag: "Journey Into Fear" and "The Inevitable Factor", the two best on this collection, are still not up to the level of album tracks. So there's a real sense of 'leftovers' which permeates the compilation, flabby non-athletics that would never have been picked for any volleyball team, and in conjunction with the cut and paste tracks or minor edits that represent about 50% of its play list, the best I could consider this is average. Not as worthless as many other collections of its type, but not all that inspired in retrospect.

Verdict: Indifference [5.75/10]

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Wine In My Hand (Third from the Sun) EP (1990)

Wine in My Hand (Third from the Sun) is just another of the myriad 'who gives a shit' singles or EPs that have always been released near or alongside full-length albums to scam a few more bucks off a band's audience. The real attraction here is the non-album cut "A Descent to Babylon (Babylon Asleep)" which never made it onto the original pressing of Vanity/Nemesis, but the titular video tune and the cover of David Bowie's "Heroes" have no more impact than anywhere else. Coupled with the gaudy, terrible and unrelated choice in comic book cover art which looks like a mash-up of the Mighty Thor and.... well, SOMETHING riding a missile, it's value is exponentially lessened and even more questionable than the band's Tragic Serenades EP circa 1986.

Was this 'fan art', submitted for the EP? Were they just smoking crack-cocaine? I'm willing to bet that both might have been involved. Anyway, "Descend to Babylon (Babylon Asleep)" is not a track to entirely scoff at. There's a nice thrashing mute groove in the verse and a couple slower passages over which the lead trills, but the rhythm guitar beneath the second fragment of the solo seems like a knockoff of several other mid-paced riffs from the full-length. It's pure Celtic Frost, with a mix of Warrior's gruff verbal constipation and a few of the Cold Lake whining lines, but in general I don't find it to be so memorable or interesting as several of its neighbors over on Vanity/Nemesis, and I can sympathize with the decision to leave it off. Otherwise, the other two tracks are identical to the full-length, and thus completely redundant, worthless to me here.

What's makes this even more of an insignificant release is the fact that "Descend to Babylon" has been re-issued twice, through both the Parched With Thirst Am I And Dying compilation (in 1992) and the 1999 Vanity/Nemesis reissue. So, for anyone (and really, EVERYONE) who has since gotten their hands on either, owning the EP is a real non issue. Collectors might want the CD or vinyl editions for completion's sake, but I doubt even they want to stare at it very long, lest it cause cancers to grow behind their eyeballs.

Verdict: Epic Fail [1.5/10]

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Vanity/Nemesis (1990)

You'll never catch me tripping over myself with ardor for the fourth Celtic Frost full-length Vanity/Nemesis, but at the very least it served as a redress or re-assessment of the tragically flawed 1988 flop Cold Lake. Shortly after that record was released, founder and vocalist Warrior performed a bit of 'housecleaning' by sending Oliver Amberg on his merry way, presumably for the betterment of all. He retained the services of drummer Stephen Priestly and guitarist Curt Victor Bryant (never trust a guy with three first names!), and also got Martin Ain involved again with the songwriting, though he only performs bass on "The Hearth Beneath" and contributes a few of the backing vocals throughout. A third guitarist, Ron Marks was used for session recording, and Bryant and Warrior also performed some of the bass lines, so there seemed like a real sense of collaboration and unity to the record, most of its constituents involved in multiple roles.

Extraneous elements like shitty hip hop intros and glam lyricism might have been cast to the wayside here, but Vanity/Nemesis certainly preserves a few of Cold Lake's aesthetics. The band's image hadn't changed a great deal, for one, and Tom's use of the whining, frog-like vocal is still manifest on a number of the compositions. Priestly's drums are still as pop-rocky as they were on the previous album, and in truth the snare seems even tidier, polished sounding to the point that it comes off a bit sterile. Frost was not about to relapse back to the double kick beats Reed St. Mark was fond of, but Stephen is otherwise up to the task. Female vocals are featured even more prominently, from the seductive whispers of "The Heart Beneath" to the more soulful style in "Wings of Solitude" which recounts "I Won't Dance (The Elders Orient)" from Into the Pandemonium, but here they seem to assimilate themselves far more assertively alongside Warrior and the heavier tone of the riffs...

And there is where the primary difference lies, the foremost reason that Vanity/Nemesis hasn't evoked such sour grapes as its predecessor, and sustains respect from many Frost fanatics even today. The heavier, chugging guitars, while not necessarily any more complex than Cold Lake's harder hitters like "Downtown Hanoi" or "Roses Without Thorns", carry a more tangible emotive power that resonates down through the years with a mystique akin to Into the Pandemonium, if glazed in the muscle enhancement of To Mega Therion. I can't be the only one who feels that this album is still a strange bastardization of glam/hard rock and thrash aesthetics, but there is a mightier furor to the chugging elements in tracks like "The Heart Beneath", "The Name of the Bride" and "Nemesis" that makes it all the more to take seriously. Hell, a few of the cuts like the ill-titled "A Kiss or a Whisper" resurrect the punkish panache that thrived on their earlier PE Morbid Tales, and here Priestly lets the double bass rip.

Mid-paced thrashing ("The Restless Seas", "Nemesis") is where this album seems most effective, and Frost resumes the throne of palm muted groove momentum without leaving behind the eros, eloquence and philosophical rambling of their lyrical matter. Acoustics are teased here, beneath the eaves of "Wings of Solitude", or just beyond the throwback "Into the Crypts of Rays" intro of "Nemesis", and they glint with appropriate sorrow, the latter dowsed in a bluesy if forgettable lead. A few tunes seem a little strange and dorky, like the hilariously named "Phallic Tantrum" with its goofy, happy verse thrashing and pinched, whiny Warrior pitch. "Vanity" and the covers of David Bowie's "Heroes" and Bryan Ferry's "This Island Earth" also seem a tad on the light side for Celtic Frost. Don't get me wrong, it was interesting to hear their muscled alterations to the source material, but they're hardly evocative of the crushing nightmares that so memorably speckled the band's morbid past.

I will say that the first chunk of the album, specifically the first four songs, are very well handled and even exclusive of the rest of Vanity/Nemesis, they surpass Cold Lake with ease. The open chords, grooves and sexy whispers that permeate "The Heart Beneath" all ramp up to a dirty but effective lead, and the whole things sounds quite damned heavy despite the polish. "Wine in My Hand (Third from the Sun)" was the first 'single', given its own EP and a rather lame, largely rock star video treatment; but the song is quite cool, especially the thick verse riffing, and the chorus in which the vocals are affixed to the percussive, escalated wail of the guitar. Tom sounds a lot heavier here, returning to the harder bark he implemented on Dethroned Emperor or To Mega Therion. "Wings of Solitude" chugs along with confidence until the acoustic break, and I love where it opens back up to the huge chords and soulfully backed 'beauty and the beast' chorus. "The Name of My Bride" might occasionally sound a whole lot like a Frost take on Megadeth's "In My Darkest Hour", thanks to the chord progression in the verses, but it's still rock solid throughout, with a nice lead.

Ultimately, though, the album lacks so much of the novel, poignant menace of To Mega Therion or the breathtaking exoticism of Into the Pandemonium that it never quite launches itself to that same plane of immortality. In truth, it's more like an edit of the Cold Lake aesthetics which takes into consideration so much of the critique of that album into an account and then executes with a far more appealing savvy. Gone are the incredibly cheesy lyrics of a "Dance Sleazy" or "Little Velvet", replaced with the more apocryphal rantings of their earlier 80s fare; yet there's only a thin line which separates the pair musically. That said, Vanity/Nemesis is a vast improvement, a cognizant rebuttal to the faux pas of its predecessor that holds up a lot more strongly through the ensuing decades. Not so good that I feel often compelled to revisit it, but engaging enough to break out once in a blue moon. Ironic, then, that it would be the last 'official' record before the shit hit the fan...

Verdict: Win [7/10] (fallen shrine of mutated sighs)

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Cold Lake (1988)

It's confusing how a band can be scaling towards the summit of its creative expression one year and then diving off a cliff the next, but in the case of the much maligned Cold Lake, that is exactly what transpired. I purchased the album when it was released in stores, with zero foreknowledge of its stylistic deviation from Into the Pandemonium, no advance screen of the "Cherry Orchards" video. About the only hint I had that the mighty had possibly fallen would have been the purple cover art, removal of the classic Celtic Frost logo and replacement with some iconic, chrome and cherry tinted logo against a nebulous purple haze. But frankly, this was nothing really unusual for the time. Saxon's Destiny, Van Halen's earlier output and a host of other metal and hard rock recordings used such stripped down, emblematic images to represent themselves, so it wasn't a deal breaker.

However, I could never have expected what came next: the enormously disappointing paradigm shift in the band's songwriting, a complete antithesis to the exotic wizardry that defined Into the Pandemonium or the leaden crushing of To Mega Therion. Celtic Frost had more or less 'gone glam', its creator surrounded by a host of new (and old) musicians and perhaps too accommodating to their desires and ideas. Tom G. Warrior has since condemned this record, citing that its faults were a result of the new four piece band dynamic and his desire to let loose and have a little fun, letting guitarist Oliver Amberg (who played briefly in Hellhammer) write a chunk of the material. That after a disappointing US tour and a perhaps too hasty decision to end the band, he was only too thrilled to experience its swift resurrection and share its fate with eager band mates. But I do have to wonder, as the heart and soul of this band, if part of the change in style was due to some inner fascination the man had with glam metal or commercial hard rock...I mean, whatever the excuse, he still signed his name to it, played on the record and appeared in the video.

There were a lot of fans who crossed over between the popular MTV garbage and the heavier speed/thrash, one dominating the mainstream, the other the underground. Both had their presence in high schools, colleges, clubs and radio playlists everywhere. But it's hard to qualify Cold Lake as a pure transformation into 'glam metal', because it didn't sound a hell of a lot like what you were hearing out of the shitty party rock bands like Poison or Warrant. This is more like 'pseudo glam'. There is still an ugly, chugging monstrosity lurking somewhere under the eaves of this record, only it'd been obfuscated beneath the facade of a bunch of hair sprayed Euro-rockers who seemed more into racing Aston Martins through Alpine speedways with a martini in one hand and the lingerie of some hair sprayed groupie slut in the other, than continuing to excel and expand the boundaries of their genre like the album's predecessor. I must admit, my very first thoughts upon listening through this album were that the band was being ironic, 'trolling' the audience with some avant-garde mockery of a scene they all loathed, thinking so far outside of the box that they placed themselves back INSIDE the box.

As history reveals, though, this was clearly not what was happening. Now, before I proceed any further, let's talk about 'image'. The fact that the band were dowsing themselves in ozone depletion or dressed in tight fitting, frilly or fancy clothes was not necessarily a huge concern of mine. I get the whole 'glam' thing, as much as I rebelled against it through high school and still sneer at it to this day, it's always been a park of the rock world. Boys like to play dress up just as girls do, and while some took and still take it to broad extremes (Japan's 'visual kei'), but for many in the Sunset Strip or traditional European metal scenes, it was just how things were done, an acceptable practice in the 80s by the raving legions of drooling fangirls and by extension, all the dudes who wanted to get in their pants. For me to write off Celtic Frost's momentary lapse into vanity as a critical fumble would be hypocritical while simultaneously ignoring the dolly wardrobes of Fifth Angel, or W.A.S.P., whose dress codes were absolutely ridiculous (i.e. retarded) and almost never seem to draw ire for it; or the many other bands who felt such a superficial allure when their music and lyrics were drawn from a deeper well.

So if Celtic Frost wanted to look like a mirror image of Hanoi Rocks, so what? The real issue for me is how this image and attitude also permeated the musical content. While Into the Pandemonium was no stranger to intricate seductions through the sensual female vocals or lyrical prose, the shallower chorus sequences to "Dance Sleazy", "Juices Like Wine" or "Tease Me" are unquestionably lame. You're still getting a lot of mystical, oblique imagery here in lines like 'obsessed with lies, in arms of sleep' or 'masking fears of silent decline', redolent of what you might read on the prior record, but the context in which they appear feels cheesy and dumbed down to the lowest common denominator. What's worse, Tom's voice sounds like a transvestite frog with a severe hernia. We'd heard his Gothic whining in the past, and it suited the music pretty well for several of the cuts off Pandemonium, but here it becomes almost unbearable when he hocks a loogie of 'check this out' during the first riff of "Seduce Me Tonight", or erupts into the plaintive whimpering of the chorus to "Juices Like Wine" or "Little Velvet", the latter of which is the second most painful point to experience on the whole album.

The first, of course, is the horrendous hip hop intro "Human". I was more than willing to excuse the amateurish proto-industrial beats of "One in Their Pride" from Into the Pandemonium, because it was an interesting choice in subject matter and experimentation. Here, though, such 'open mindedness' doesn't seem even remotely like a good idea, nor does it match the tone of the remaining record, and so Cold Lake is automatically off to a terrible start. Another questionable decision was to leave in the snippets of mic chatter after the band did their takes at the ends of many of the tracks. I realize they were trying to seem all lighthearted, organic and raw, but they make the songs even more difficult to approach with any semblance of seriousness. I must also point out that there are a few riffs here which seem to have been lazily or unconsciously retread through the album: the opening guitar in "Blood on Kisses" sounds quite a lot like "Seduce Me Tonight", and the groove in "Little Velvet" sounds similar to the verse riffing in "Cherry Orchards".

Yet, despite its many flaws and disappointments, the sense of utter revulsion and betrayal that the album evokes in me as in many others, I cannot entirely write it off, and never have. The reason being that, for what its worth (and that's not a lot), I generally find myself nodding along to various of the riffs, digging some of the guitar progressions. In fact, had the goal of Warrior and his new crew been solely to write a raw, back to basics Celtic Frost record, I don't think it would have received such negative blowback. Tracks like "Cherry Orchids", with its straight and airy guitars, pumping bass, male/female vocal interchange, or "Petty Obsession", bristling with memorable mutes and chords in an admittedly charismatic flow, would have been more than acceptable if not for Warrior's sobbing timbre. "Downtown Hanoi" and "Roses Without Thorns" have some muscular, semi-memorable riffs as well, the latter with a cute and bluesy curve to it around 1:10. "(Once) They Were Eagles" and "Juices Like Wine" have some solid, inherent melodies in their chords which wouldn't have been out of place for a band like Queensryche or King Diamond.

That's a pretty good chunk of the album, that, handled differently, might have salvaged some dignity. Granted, even if this were recorded with a more modern Monotheist production, Tom growling throughout and far heavier drumming, it still wouldn't be as interesting as the two previous albums, but I certainly feel there's enough to the song structures that they're not a total waste, and thus I've never held this album so low as a lot of those staggering disappointments of the 90s that were foisted upon us by more popular acts. I hold Cold Lake in higher regard than, say, Load or Diabolus in Musica, The Least Successful Human Cannonball or Stomp 442, but that's not saying a lot, since these are essentially feces given musical form, so bad they stink across the decades. But then, it's not like Cold Lake is a whiff of fresh breath, either, and many of the criticisms leveled at it are all too glaring with veracity.

From a studio standpoint, one might argue that Tony Platt's production job did the material little enough service. Quite an experienced engineer, his experience lay in a lot of NWOBHM or hard rock albums from AC/DC, Samson, Trust, Krokus, Motörhead and so forth, so it's not an inappropriate terrible match, but the vocals and leads feel a bit on the loud side, and though I don't have a personal problem with the airiness created through the reverb (a common trait in the 80s), it doesn't make for the most potent rhythm guitar tone which might have contributed to overall heaviness. Jan Nemec's work on Into the Pandemonium was far more impressive and refined. Stephen Priestly had previously appeared on the Morbid Tales EP, but his drumming here is little more than standard hard rock fare circa Bobby Blotzer, Tommy Lee, etc. The leads are relatively interesting, messy and wailing, yet well defined enough to shift favorably alongside the supporting rhythms. There's not a lot wrong with Michelle Villanueva's sultry guest vocals, but in the Cold Lake context ("Cherry Orchards", "Little Velvet") they come off almost as corny as Warrior himself.

In summation, this is not an album I feel so strongly against that I'll curse it to the end of my existence. Of the many thousands of metal recordings I've experienced through my years, there are a good number I find more irritating and outright offensive. But at best, the songwriting is weak and misguided, a textbook case of what NOT to do when your band is an established cult favorite, regardless of how much you're seeking acceptance after a perceived slump in momentum. What were they thinking? That their underground audience was going to somehow forget who they were, or what they represented for extreme metal? That somehow the larger glam audience was going to accept their dirty, heavier riffing and herniated toad eroticism in lieu of "Talk Dirty to Me", "Smokin' in the Boys Room" or "Living on a Prayer"? It boggles the mind, but more regrettably, it's a tragedy that some decent riffs were thrown to the wolves, sentenced to drown, down with the rest of the ship. I wish I had more to say in its favor, as I don't hate it down to the guts like so many others, but there's just no happy ending for Cold Lake, and there never will be.

Verdict: Fail [4/10] (roses for an unborn face)

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Into the Pandemonium (1987)

Into the Pandemonium is not my favorite Celtic Frost production, but it's by far their most eclectic and creative, as evidenced by the wide array of styles implemented through its course. It's not at all dismissive of the slight intervals of evolution which led to its being, but if we were to compare any two of the Swiss legends' releases side to side, it would represent the largest solitary gulf. I realize there are those who would argue that its glam infested successor, Cold Lake was their biggest deviation, but I've never thought of that as more or less than a foundation of traditional Frost grooves and riffs drowned in an unfortunate, limp wristed whining and and unwelcome change in the band's image. Into the Pandemonium, on the other hand, feels as if the trio had gone on some worldwide vacation for two years, smoked from a variety of pipes and hookahs over numerous continents, and then returned by elephant back to their native Zurich.

This was a brave album, born almost entirely of exotic, worldly compulsion and a clear desire to bend the boundaries of possibility for not only Celtic Frost alone, but the entire metal genre. There were a lot of other bands evolving and enriching their sound at this time in both the US and Europe, but where an act like Running Wild, King Diamond or Savatage was centered on shaping and refining itself in the familiar environs of its earlier albums, the Swiss trio were reaching for the stars, consuming entire outside genres of music and then forging them into an impressive armor of eccentricity. To that effect, I can certainly understand the hesitation or outright resistance some felt towards the idiosyncratic gravity of Into the Pandemonium, but it's not one I can in any good conscience share. Growth and innovation are not mandatory traits in my enjoyment of a metal recording, but if I were to ply through a database of all time favorites it would prove a component of the vast majority. Music (and by extension, much of reality) is a kinetic voice. Not static. One can expand with its near endless variations, or contract from it and seek shelter beneath its prehistoric statuary. Celtic Frost chose the former, and so did I.

Of course, one of the beauties of this record is that they've done so without abandoning the backbone of their earlier works. Much of Into the Pandemonium is still comprised of the signature, sludgy thrashing rhythms they are known for circa Morbid Tales, only polished up a bit to match the hazy mystique of their neighbors. "Inner Sanctum", one of the most substantial 5+ minute tracks on the album is cast in the same vein as much of To Mega Therion, hook after hook of primal, pummeling goodness with Tom's traditional, constipated vocal barking. There is some slight increase of complexity from, say, a "Jewel Throne" in the sheer variety of riffs and the drumming, but it's not likely to offend expectations for further, mosh ready fare. "Babylon Fell" would have fit in perfectly with the prior album, it's huge and unforgettable palm muted grooves some of the heaviest in the Frost lexicon. Even the symphonic ingredients are not necessarily news. The beautiful "Oriental Masquerade" has a similar texture to the "Innocence and Wrath" intro, with horns, timpanis and sluggish riffing redolent of a Japanese giant monster movie from decades past...only the violins are truly top shelf here.

As much as I enjoy such songs, however, I can't help but drift towards the more extrinsic pieces that mottle the playlist. "Tristesses de la Lune" is perhaps the most ambitious track they've ever summoned forth, a sweeping and gorgeous string orchestration with a beautiful female guest spot in French, worthy of some of the better European composers of past centuries. The lyrics are eloquent, and the imagery evoked through the performance is like something you'd probably rent a suit for to witness at an opera hall. The Anglicized metallic version "Sorrows of the Moon", available on most of the CD releases, is less appealing, perhaps, but there's no doubt it was easier to pull off live and justifies inclusion. "I Won't Dance (The Elders Orient)" is another total standout here, a leaden rocker upon which Tom asserts a cleaner, passionate Gothic tone to his verses, returning to his usual barking temperament for the pre-chorus and chorus on which he's backed up by a 'soul' style female voice. Motown meets metallic, Mesopotamian antiquity.

I would also point out "Mesmerized", which has a similar Warrior vocal treatment and a glint of lush acoustics threaded through the verse, and a somber melodic passage through the bridge that inspire at least two dozen Paradise Lost tunes. Or "Rex Irae (Requiem)" which is this exquisite, 6 minute Gothic doom operetta with more of Mark's beloved timpani strikes and yet another lovely intrusion of strings. The vocal interplay between Tom and the female opera strain is impressive, especially where he's backed up by a blaring horn note, but there's also a more intricate, percussive thrashing in there with some driving, double bass kicks and a sequence of narrative exchange which is stunningly effective. With ease one of the most intricate tunes in all of the band's litany, passing beyond the realm of mere music to that of sensory experience as the listener's imagination drifts through ancient empires, passions and ritual incense. I DARE one of this album's detractors to create something so immortal and compelling.

But then, of course, the Swiss go even further out on a limb here, with the inclusion of the proto industrial track "One in Their Pride". This is not the greatest cut on the album, In fact it's one of the few exceptions to its near flawless musical interior, but nonetheless it was a fascinating departure for the band, a paean to the first man on the moon (Neil Armstrong) and a testament to human achievement. Musically, though, it's completely different for Celtic Frost. Primitive electro kicks reminiscent of some missing link between Kraftwerk and early Ministry (or Nitzer Ebb). Wailing, atonal strings and myriad speech samples abound in its swirling vacuum, to the point that it seems to conjure the image of some satellite spinning off beyond the earth's atmospheric envelope. Even stranger, perhaps, was the decision to open the album with a cover of the Wall of Voodoo's "Mexican Radio". Don't get me wrong, the LA New Wavers' hit is in good hands here, just given the Frost 'treatment' with heavier guitars and angrier, gruff vocals in between the backing shouts of the chorus, but, really...who woulda thunk it?

Into the Pandemonium trumps expectations at nearly every turn, but its decisions never feel rash or impulsive, no matter how unusual. Once again, as upon To Mega Therion, I felt that Warrior was trying to train his audience in the act of a wider, aesthetic appreciation. Take a few minutes to cross-reference the lyrics here with almost anything else in the metal spectrum in the mid 80s and you'll discover just how poetic and eloquent they are, how out of place amidst the usual volley of machine gun testosterone. These aren't mere hymns to nuclear war and TV Evangelists, but deeper reflections upon mortality, nature and the fate of archaic civilizations. Of course, as in "Babylon Fell", these are easy enough to relate to current events, but the prose is so simple and classy that it feels as fresh today as on its original release. What's more, the partial use of the "Hell" scene from Hieronymus Boschs's early 16th century triptych The Garden of Earthly Lights is perfect, its colors, structures and figures so immaculately in sync with the atmosphere of the songs that you wonder if they were written while staring at it...

All of these ingredients add up to what I'd dub the last of the 'essential Frost' recordings. Not that later albums like Vanity/Nemesis or Monotheist lack their charms, but they're nowhere near as imaginative and ageless as most of this content. "One In Their Pride" doesn't hold up for me in terms of quality so much as an example of experimentation gone awry, and the cover of "Mexican Radio" is naturally not so intriguing as the originals, but otherwise this album should be remembered as nothing less than an anomaly. A phenomenon whose alluring lyrical imagery, intricate variation and balanced production ensure that it survives as one of the finest examples of the avant-garde to arrive in heavy rock since the proggish embellishments of the 70s. Mood and inspiration, songwriting and distinction. This lacks none of it. Feast your ears.

Verdict: Epic Win [9.5/10] (may they live in ecstasy)

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Tragic Serenades EP (1986)

Tragic Serenades was another of those lovely excesses of the 80s which had very little authentic justification for existence other than its commercial advantages. All three of the tracks here had already been released ("Jewel Throne" and "The Usurper" through To Mega Therion; "Return to the Eve" through the Morbid Tales EP), but Tom G. Warrior claims to have wanted to ramp up the production on a number of the tunes and incorporate Martin Ain's bass lines as a replacement for those Dominic Steiner recorded on the full-length. Makes sense, but then, why not just re-record the whole thing? Were the album versions of "Jewel Throne" and "The Usurper" such a legitimate cause for concern? I rather enjoyed them, and to be honest, I don't find these to be much improved...

But hey, it's got a Celtic Frost logo on it. Obscure, minimal, and pretty fascinating cover image. The market for this band was still quite young, and by '86 a lot of folks had yet to hear them, but thrash and speed metal were starting to blow up thanks to bands like Metallica, Anthrax and Slayer. So it would not have surprised me that Tragic Serenades was a first introduction for a number of their flock, and in fact experienced this first hand with a friend who called me over to listen to the 'new' Frost tape, only to then rush home and dub him the entire To Mega Therion since it was obvious that he wasn't getting the 'whole picture' (the selection here lacks some of the important, grandiose, atmospheric French horn stuff on the LP). The fact is, a ton of EPs and singles like this one, some with only the most minor of distinctions and studio tweaks, were unleashed upon a fan base that presumably would buy them for collection purposes or to shell out a few more dollars to their favorite labels and artists. A practice I didn't have a huge problem with at the time, but then...there's a reason why Eyes of Horror retains its value and Tragic Serenades does not.

To be fair, the production here of the album cuts seems even more raw and potent than it was before, and Celtic Frost at their angriest to its day. Ain's bass lines don't differ much in tone, but they feel more spacious and atmospheric and lend themselves just as well to the music as Steiner's. I like his slides and aggression in "Jewel Throne", and if I'm not mistaken it seems a bit more distorted in general than on the album. "The Usurper" comes off a fraction more groovy than the prior incarnation, but I don't really notice a gulf in quality between the two versions due to the bass or enhanced mix. The last track, an alternate studio take on "Return to the Eve" was included to show a lighter hearted side of the band, so you get a lot of hoarser spit and 'hngggs' from Warrior, and Reed St. Mark also adds some vocals with an even gruffer tone that...to be truthful...I wouldn't have minded on a lot more of their early tunes. That said, this incarnation of "Return..." seems mildly goofy in retrospect...

But the fact that it was also included on the re-release of To Mega Therion, and in fact, this whole EP has been retroactively added to subsequent issues of the album, renders it even more obsolete than it was when it first came out. Tragic Serenades is certainly the sort of product that tugs at the heartstrings of a good number of fans, and I can admire its nostalgic appeal, but I just don't see any ultimate purpose for it when I've already got Morbid Tales and To Mega Therion. I never lost any sleep thinking to myself 'hrm, what if Martin Eric Ain had re-recorded the bass parts for these tracks'. Not to downplay the guy's importance in the band's legacy (for better AND worse, down the road) but the full-length wasn't broken, and didn't need fixing. For me, this feels like thinly veiled contractual filler. And the 11 and a half minutes of redundancy and taking the piss here do nothing except occupy that Graveyard of Dusty Cassettes that I've no reason to return to...

Verdict: Fail [3.75/10]

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - To Mega Therion (1985)

If Celtic Frost's early EPs represented a dark dungeon of forsaken pleasures, then To Mega Therion must be the opulent obsidian stronghold which covers it; the bastion of utter darkness from which its perverse overlord metes his reign upon the surrounding realms. Heavier, more consistent and more riff laden than either of its terse predecessors, it's essentially the pinnacle of creation for one of the most innovative metal acts of the 90s, ushering in an entirely new domain of exotic atmospheres and hinting at myriad possibilities for further exploration. We know in retrospect that several of its future fluctuations would succeed more than others, but To Mega Therion added a fresh, coherent sheen of midnight to not only the band's own morbid legacy, but to extreme metal in general. An opaque veil that has yet to be lifted.

Beyond this, To Mega Therion is an album I also hold dear due to its influence upon my own development on my second (and later primary) instrument, the guitar. Officially, I was studying under an instructor who thankfully customized his lessons towards my taste through a lot of hard rock tunes (Dokken, Scorpions etc), and a brief conceit to teach me "Jump in the Fire"; but in the company of my 13 year old thoughts, with an old Peavey amp in the basement and a mutant Kramer Striker, I was plugging away to the inspiration of Celtic Frost, among a few others. The slower chugging and expressive but simple power chord patterns used in Tom G. Warrior's composition provided the perfect initiation to novice thrashing. Simple to ascertain and execute with standard tuning, and heavier than most terrestrial planets, To Mega Therion was an infallible seduction to a darker musical sphere, and I can't be alone in thinking this: countless thrash, heavy, doom, black and death metal bands over the course of decades would use its content as an aesthetic blueprint for their varied careers.

Stylistically, the lion's share of the material written for the full-length does not deviate greatly from Morbid Tales and Emperor's Return. Or for that matter, Hellhammer. The focus is far greater on slower, crushing numbers in the vein of "Procreation (of the Wicked)", "Return to the Eve" and such than the hardcore-infused punk riffing prevalent on several of the EP tracks, but you can still clearly here the roots from which the Swiss legends sprung, and many of the chord patterns found on cuts like "Jewel Throne", "Eternal Summer" and "Dawn of Megiddo" clearly reflect the same balance of punctilious, primal composition with eloquent lyrical despair. Celtic Frost was always been a band aware of its technical boundaries, as far as musical ability. They weren't forcing the borders of the genre so much as their German and Bay Area contemporaries, but they took what they had and made it work, conjuring aggression through the atmosphere that the thick picking implied, to compensate for this general lack of speed...

What this album might lack in machine gun drumming and complex string wizardry, it more than makes up for in its several brilliant decisions to incorporate orchestration via the use of a French horn (Wolf Bender), shrill operatic female vocals (Claudia-Maria Mokri) and Reed St. Mark banging on a timpani in addition to his normal kit. The intro piece, "Innocence and Wrath" feels like a European answer to the classic Godzilla theme, and it's no accident: the piece instantly sets a mood for the remainder of the track list, and when the general motif returns in "Dawn of Megiddo", or culminates in the operatic chorus to "Necromantical Screams", the whole of To Mega Therion is bound together in a pervasive, drowning and depressive atmosphere that to its day was incredibly novel and immediately unforgettable. I can't say that I love all of the sparse female shrieks throughout the album. They often grate a fraction more than intended. But how many Gothic, doom and black metal bands today rely so heavily this technique in their 'beauty and the beast' interplay?

Despite its deathly demeanor, which arguably peaks in the doomed gait of "Dawn of Megiddo", To Mega Therion is not an album lacking in puerile, rampant energy. Tracks like "Jewel Throne" and "Fainted Eyes" are rife with primordial, thrashing energy and intense grooves anchored by St. Mark's muscular throughput. I'm not trying to advocate for the jock mosh sect, which has transformed through the decades from an innocent and mutual release of testosterone to alpha male preening, but if you can't sway your fists (or at least your head) to the riff set of "Jewel Throne", it's likely you just hate thrash metal. Walk away, man. Just walk away. To boot, this is one of the tracks which accelerates itself, culminating in some of the punk pacing of their earlier releases. "Circle of the Tyrants" was also drafted to this album from the Emperor's Return EP, and while I have maintained a slight preference towards the original, the brighter, raw treatment here fits well into its neighbors. Another example of how the album can shelf its weighty Gothic atmosphere to flex some brute strength at the audience. Yet another: Dominic Steiner's loud bass chords during "Necromantical Screams".

Tom's vocals are superb here, and arguably the best they've ever felt on any of the full-lengths. Dark, tense, and cumbersome, his accent and timbre barking out the dark prose like the noblest of savages. An exception might be the bonus studio jam "Return of the Eve", on which the vocals are so heavily effected that they can feel as silly as they are charming, but this was not a core component of the original album and thus easily brushed off. What's more, the lyrics retain the serious nature of the earlier works. Slayer was singing about Satan and psycho killers, Venom about Satan and cocaine, Destruction about Satan and the meat packing industry, but there was something so ominous, grandiose and mature about Celtic Frost's paeans to avarice, pride, and the lessons inherent in the occult and mythology. The sequential, conceptual bindings of "The Usurper", "Jewel Throne" are also interesting. Once again, a huge source of inspiration, this time for tens of thousands of black metal bands to follow (notably Emperor and the earlier Darkthrone canon).

All this aside, I must admit that I have never found The Mega Therion to be the most flawless of jewels. A huge part of this is that I don't really care for the instrumental "Tears in a Prophet's Dream", an electro/ritual/ambient track which feels even less coherent than "Danse Macabre" on the Morbid Tales EP. It's not that I don't appreciate Celtic Frost's desire to experiment, but the random bass chortling, percussion and goofy wails here have always conspired to take me straight out of the experience. It seems like they threw it together and placed it on the album just because 'they could' rather than to pursue an honest artistic abstraction from the metal surroundings. Thankfully, the track that follows "Necromantical Screams" is so damned good, or "Tears..." would seem even more of a souring anticlimax. Otherwise, a few of the shrill vocals and the fact that "Circle of the Tyrants" feels mildly redundant being here would be the only nitpicks I could launch against this timeless behemoth, and for the latter...I will begrudgingly admit that, as one of their best songs, it belonged on a full-length so more could hear it.

Coverage of this staggering monstrosity could never be complete without a nod to the choice in cover art. Though Geiger's Satan I had been originally conceived in the 70s, it was the perfect match for Frost's ungodly lyrical explorations. The cynical, sacrilege of its imagery would prove iconic to generations of metal fans, atheists, occultists, and it was also nice of Warrior to 'keep it in the family' (aka country) by collaborating with the Swiss surrealist. What's more, it to me represents that Celtic Frost wanted to hint at a wider range of classicism and art beyond the metal spectrum, almost as if they were prompting the audience to smarten up, expand ourselves and look further into other fields of depth and vision (a tactic they'd repeat with the use of the Hieronymous Bosch painting for Into the Pandemonium). I'm sure for many of us, it worked. By extension, so does the album. As grim an enlightenment as nearly anything that came out of this formative, important period in aural extremes, and in my opinion, one of the best Swiss works in the entire genre (excepting only Coroner's 1988-89 masterworks and Samael's underrated Passage, all of which are of course either related to or directly inspired by this very band).

Verdict: Epic Win [9.75/10] (you won't see the coming fall)

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Emperor's Return EP (1985)

Snakes and ladies. When you get right down to it, they're the building block of civilizations. Morals. Faiths, or at least one faith. We might not all have lives blessed with the same caliber of coiled demons and chained, moppy headed (or bald) punk harlots who confront us from the cover of Celtic Frost's second EP, Emperor's Return, but I can't have been the only young teenager to have felt a strange seduction at the sight. Fortunately, this packs more than a mere penis pump, but a notable stride forward in the quality and style that were introduced through Hellhammer's Apocalyptic Raids and its direct precursor, the 1984 release Morbid Tales. Sharpened, polished, call it what you will, but Emperor's Return is responsible for at least one of the best cuts in this Swiss band's repertoire, and one of the grooviest, darkest hymns in all of 80s thrash.

Perhaps the writing here represents one of the most marginal evolutions in the Tom G. Warrior canon, for the riffing structure is not a far cry from previous tracks like "Return to the Eve" or "Procreation (Of the Wicked)". I found the production on these five tunes to sound less ruddy, though that strangely grisly and fulfilling guitar tone remains intact. Simple and effective chord sequences which rarely deviate from the band's prior curriculum, but they seem to bear a bolder sense of darkness, an inescapable and suffocating sense of being stuffed into a crypt where the dead dance by day and necromantic rituals and forsaken eros are performed by the few traces of moonlight that filter through the stone cracks of the ceiling. What I'm trying to express in such crowded and colorful hues is that Emperor's Return rocks: pretty much from the first notes of "Dethroned Emperor" to the faster paced speed/dirt of "Visual Aggression", you are getting your ass kicked.

"Circle of the Tyrants" is my favorite of this lot, and arguably the band's career highlight, fully cognizant of the punk and hardcore aesthetics that informed Frost's roots, with a percussive use of chorus to split the verses, and some of their most immense grooves, like the dark and potent riff that erupts about 1:40 into the tune. As usual, Tom G. Warrior places just the right amount of echo on his vocals so he seems to be drifting into your ears from the dust of decay, and there are also some garbled pitch shifted incantations here which add nicely to the context. "Morbid Tales" features a prominent, thudding bass courtesy of Martin Eric Ain, and another classic, unforgettable heavy palm mute in the verse riff, with some of Warrior's unmistakable rock star swagger in the 'ows' and 'yeahs' found therein. Reed St. Mark offers a more muscular double bass in the bridge of the track, and overall I'd consider the drums more consistent and rock solid than those of Morbid Tales, and Celtic Frost proves yet again why they're so influential upon the decades of extreme metal to follow.

The latter tracks on the EP like "Suicidal Winds" and "Visual Aggression" have always held a slightly less important place in my memory than the first three, though they've also got a more grimy interface and rely on some of the faster riffing that I wasn't always so thrilled with on the first EP. In a way, the grooves that often manifest in Frost tunes would not be so effective without a change up from this almost pure dirtcore momentum (the NY band Sheer Terror would later channel this into excellence on their classic LP Just Can't Hate Enough), but I just never found the note sequences to be so enduring. That said, both of the tunes are admittedly consistent in disposition to the forerunners, and they certainly don't break the 21 minutes of bludgeoning, grooving and driving momentum.

Hands down, Emperor's Return is the best of Celtic Frost's non full-length fare (unless you're experiencing it in conjunction with the first EP on the CD reissue), and the ramp up towards the band's most brilliant album. Normally it might lose a little luster in the fact that "Circle of the Tyrants" would also appear on To Mega Therion, but I honestly prefer this less atmospheric version for its earthly charms, and alongside "Dethroned Emperor" and "Morbid Tales" it belongs on any highlight reel of their stronger work. I also love the cover art, the immortal lyrics ("are you morbid?"), and the truly oblique atmosphere the band is able to evoke through the riffing and bare minimum of other effects: it feels tangibly, invariably evil, like the musings of a mummified despot who longs to slake his thirst on the sanguine essence of the world once more. Whether you've got an original tape or LP or picture disc or you're loving it up alongside its older sibling, it belongs wherever there is good taste. Blood and concubines optional.

Verdict: Win [8.5/10] (locked forever in a veil of shame)

http://www.celticfrost.com/

Celtic Frost - Morbid Tales EP (1984)

What I love most about the retrospective analysis of the metal music from my youth, that which I've matured alongside for decades now, is just how fascinating and divergent its evolution seems in the rear view mirror. How different nations and scenes contributed to parallel growth, structurally and lyrically. How particular releases launched a thousand ships like the fabled Helen of Troy, while others could not inspire disembarkation from even the scantest of flotilla. Funny then, that even among all of these coordinated fronts of competitive and emulous transformation, Swiss godfathers Celtic Frost stands as more or less an anomaly, an anthropological crossroads between the cultures of thrash metal, doom, hardcore punk, and the black and death metal scenes which had yet to fully embody their own identities.

It would be hard to take an accurate count of how many recordings have been directly inspired by Morbid Tales, because we're at a stage now where even its own aesthetic offspring are now at legendary status. Darkthrone is the perfect example. Both their death metal debut Soulside Journey and seminal black metal mutation Ablaze in the Norther Sky were openly, enormously inspired by Tom G. Warrior and crew, in atmosphere, attitude AND actualized riff structure; and I could name hundreds of shameless knockoffs of that enduring Norse outfit. Granted, Celtic Frost (and its prior incarnation Hellhammer) were not themselves without some precedent. Punk and hardcore music had by this point arrived and spawned a number of aggressive legends of their own (Discharge's Hear Nothing See Nothing Say Nothing among them), while a not insignificant fraction of this band's relentlessness and filth might be attributed to UK demons Venom and Motörhead; lyrically the former and musically the pair. Tendrils of descent from the crushing pathos of 70s Sabbath are undeniable.

Even inclusive of these considerations, though, Morbid Tails is a distinct landmark on a trail of carnage that stems from the dawn of musical extremity to the ongoing struggle for attaining that next 'level' of aggression. By comparison to faster, more lethal contemporaries of the period like Bathory's self-titled debut, Slayer's Show No Mercy or Destruction's Sentence of Death, the material here often lacks finesse or the same knack for riffing complexity. Celtic Frost had cleaned itself up from Hellhammer, and the production values are noticeably more accessible and professional than the Apocalyptic Raids EP from the same year. That's not necessarily a positive, and I might personally prefer the earlier archetype to their first two releases under the new identity, but it makes sense for a band whose intent was growth alongside the emergent and diversified European underground of extreme metal. These days it's a badge of honor in certain scenes to produce the most amateur, afflicted and unwashed material possible, but by the mid 80s, that practice generally manifest as a symptom of having little to no budget.

However, fret not, heralds of grime, because Morbid Tales still retains the ruddy riffing texture and dynamic sensibility of its predecessors. Blazing, punk guitar passages are interspersed with slower palm muted hardcore/thrash sequences, the latter just as worthy of the primordial mosh pits as what the Stormtroopers of Death would soon start to build overseas. Of the five metal tracks on the EP (excluding "Danse Macabre"), there is a fairly even distribution of fast and slow material. "Into the Crypts of Rays", "Visions of Mortality" and "Nocturnal Fear" all feature rapt excursions into velocity, while "Procreation (Of the Wicked)" and "Return to the Eve" adhere to a plodding, crushing consistency which feels incredibly heavy despite the clarity and polish of the guitar tone. Martin Ain's low end and Stephen Priestly's drumming might not seem extravagant, but they add to the bruised ugliness of the music, in particular the syrup-thick bass which often competes with the guitar for attention, even if the notation runs a similar course.

I would like to spend some time discussing the signature components and techniques that these Swiss legends brought to the table. First and foremost, the corpulent and molten 'grooves' bear some mentioning. A strong example would be the opening for "Procreation (of the Wicked)", with its slosh of chords against strong palm muted chugging that is pretty much the default for how thousands of bands in various genres build a riff even today. Prior to this, I think only Sabbath could crush so hard ("Symptoms of the Universe", etc). But Celtic Frost also evolved a rare characteristic of opening and closing off certain measures with a simple, bended note that oozed torment while giving a false sense of 'incompletion' to the overall riff, a technique that progeny like Darkthrone would recycle for decades. They also stuck to a lot of very basic ascending and descending patterns or chords that helped solidify the grooves without scattering themselves over the fret board, like the incredible mosh riff in the lead-bridge of "Return to the Eve".

Most importantly, though, are the vocals of Tom G. Warrior, which sound like a man choking on crud while clearing his lungs, or some constipated, drunken drifter emerging from a bar in Zurich to take a squat in a dank alley of refuse. With the right amount of echo or reverb here, his bark sounds incredibly oblique, evil and memorable, and the guy's 'hoos' and 'has' and 'ooos' are just legendary, a clear remnant of his showmanlike, hard rock forebears. Surely there's a bit of Cronos and Lemmy in the 'spirit' of his delivery, but his thick accent ensures a unique quality that, to its day, I know I hadn't experienced. The lyrics are also pretty fucking impressive, paeans to the contrasted knight/serial killer Gilles de Rais ("Into the Crypts of Rays"), ritual magic ("Visions of Mortality"), the succession of original sin from the Old Testament ("Procreation of the Wicked"), the dreamstate ("Return to the Eve"), and even Lovecraft's Mythos ("Nocturnal Fear"). A pretty eclectic array of dark subjects delivered through thoughtful, image-thick prose that was well ahead of many of the band's metal contemporaries (internationally).

Despite all of its myriad qualities, and the many distinctions I've described herein, I will admit that Morbid Tales is not quite deserving of a bust upon the pedestal of perfection that others might claim. Its primal transgressions I take no issue with: not the simplicity of the songwriting structures, nor the predictable flow of the riffing. But, for example, I don't like the lead guitars, which are fleeting and messy but lack the energetic, unhinged pizzazz that bands like Slayer and Pestilence whipped up through the 80s. While consistent with one another, and the mood of both the iconic cover art and lyrical matter, I've never found all of the rhythm guitars to be that exciting ("Nocturnal Fear" and "Into the Crypts of Rays" have a handful I could do without). And then there are the experimental flourishes, not as eclectic and variegated as those later manifest to their sophomore album Into the Pandemonium, but not very interesting either. I like the wall of tortured howls that inaugurates "Into the Crypts...", but the 4 minute ambient ritual "Danse Macabre" sacrifices a little catchiness for its creepiness.

Screams, whispers, a piano here, a violin shred there, a morbid mantra. Acceptable for a Halloween evening, since it sounds like it might hail from one of those holiday CDs you buy at the grocery store; or as background noise for some obscure, Gothic seduction, but not something I would expressly seek out for its own allure... Fortunately, none of these minor mars can heavily compromise the surface area of the EP, and its importance as a cornerstone for the incessant thrash, death, doom and black metal lineage of the 90s and beyond still stands as it approaches its third decade of existence. It's not the peak of this band's repertoire (wait a year), nor a Lord of the Rings for extreme metal. I'd liken it instead to Robert Howard's original Conan stories: elegant but barbaric, crude but descriptive. But is the one really all that less influential than the other in the end? One final note: I was originally exposed to this and its successor EP (Emperor's Return) separately, so I'll review them as such. Today's crowd has the convenience of acquiring them on a single disc, which in no way decreases their individual worth, and makes for a rather consistent full length experience.

Verdict: Win [8.25/10] (obsessed by the nightmare's sound)

http://www.celticfrost.com/