Dimmu Borgir

Grand Serpent Rising

It's hard to believe it’s been 8 years since Dimmu Borgir’s last album, Eonian. That’s partly because of the alarming acceleration of linear time that we experience with age, and partly because we’re still listening to it regularly. In our mind, it remains fresh, new, and peerless. So impressed were we that, back in 2018, it was one of our albums of the year. Back then, we gushed about “an ornately gothic, macabre collection of morose beauty”, and stated that, “[i]f this is what Dimmu Borgir can do after eight years off, then we’ll happily wait another eight for the follow-up". We’re not claiming any preternatural prescience but if Shagrath & Co., are going to deliver albums of Eonian’s quality in octennial measures, they’ll be worth the wait.

Which brings us nicely to their latest offering: Grand Serpent Rising. Firmly fixed as our number one black metal act, there are butterflies in our stomach and a fluttering of our heart as we press play on the new album. Like any new release from a favourite author or film director, we just don’t want to be disappointed. Hopes and expectations need to be managed.

The opening track, ‘Tridentium’, kicks things off with a slow build, ticking all the boxes we’ve come to expect from Dimmu Borgir, and any pre-listen nerves are settled. ‘Ascent’ is a fierce shred and harks back to their older “pure” black metal days. It soon becomes clear that Grand Serpent Rising is a reaction of sorts to Eonian, which caused discord amongst the black metal community and accusations of selling out. The choral and orchestral elements, though still present, are low in the mix and no longer drive the songwriting.

The mix itself is questionable. While it may receive merit from black metal purists for its intensity, it loses clarity too often. Aspects of the music are buried beneath a mélange of sound. Again, this is something that will be familiar to old-school black metal fans but, given the crispness of the recording and the time invested, it seems wasteful.

Where Eonian felt like a leap forward for Dimmu Borgir, Grand Serpent Rising feels like a step backwards. We can’t shake the feeling that the band have paid too much heed to the unrest among their older fanbase and that a bit more courage in their creativity would have improved things. Instead, we have a retrograde album and a hope that, in 8 years' time, we’ll hear something a bit more progressive from them.

Bjorn ‘Speed’ Strid is a busy man. He’s best known for his vocal work in melodic death metal band, Soilwork, whose eleventh album is due for release in January. Aside from featuring on Dyecrest’s latest album, he has also been recording and touring with The Night Flight Orchestra. They released their fourth album earlier this year and what started as a fun side project has become something more serious.

Strid and Soilwork guitarist David Andersson came up with the idea of writing some classic rock/AOR songs while on tour in America. The duo’s dalliance with ‘70s and ‘80s hard rock now boasts eight band members and, possibly as a result, their last album was a tad overblown. True to their influences, they followed up the ass-kicking pop magic of 2017’s excellent Amber Galactic with a record that sounds like it was recorded on a massive budget with a stockpile of cocaine. Nuclear Blast are re-releasing NFO’s back catalogue to capitalise on their unexpected popularity so I’ve been checking out their debut album, Internal Affairs.

It’s an inauspicious introduction for the formative band when ‘Siberian Queen’ fails to take flight but when the opening riff of ‘California Morning’ arrives, the album kicks into gear. ‘Glowing City Madness’ has a Creedence Clearwater Revival/Bob Seger vibe and an Abbey Road style vocal melody; even the solo sounds like George Harrison. The excellent, high energy stomp of ‘West Ruth Avenue’ is irresistible while ‘Transatlantic Blues’ starts as a piano based ballad and manages to stay the right side of cheesy.

‘Miami 502’ is an unabashed homage to ‘Hot For Teacher’. The title track’s synth-bass funk and string stabs point to the future of the band. Along the way there are nods to Foreigner, Journey, Rainbow, Van Halen and ELO. ‘A Song For Ingeborg’ was originally a bonus track for the Japanese market but its inclusion here is a wee touch of genius. After 11 tracks of cheesy rock, the acoustic arpeggios and French lyrics serve as a welcome palette cleanser.

If you only get one NFO album, then get Amber Galactic, but if you want more then go back to the start and pick up Internal Affairs. It may not be as ambitious and fully realised as their magnum opus but it’s got some serious tunes.

Internal Affairs is available from Nuclear Blast here.