Satanica

Satanica is the first Behemoth release into their current blackened death style. After the failed experiment of Grom and forgotten Pandemonic Incantations, Behemoth decided to go for a more “commercial” sound, thus Satanica has no black metal elements in it like that of previous Behemoth releases. What has replaced those elements is what defines Behemoth as a band today, very fast technical drumming, heavy and brutal guitar riffs, and deep choppy vocals via Nergal. Although Satanica alienated most of Behemoth’s older fans, what they produce with Satanica is something much more complex and enjoyable than that of pre Grom era Behemoth.

The best description of Satanica would be a less heavy and aggressive version of Thelma.6 or a less complex version of Zos Kia Kultus. Its full of your trademark Behemoth style blackened death metal. Decade of Therion displays what Satanica, and Behemoth, do best, combining technical drumming and heavy aggressive guitars and make them sound like one instrument, while having Nergal add vocals that fit the rhythm perfectly. Its moments like these that make Behemoth’s music stand out on Satanica, where all the various elements, drumming, guitar work, vocals, and bass all come together to produce one distinguished sound (somewhat like Blizzard Beasts by Immortal). Another stand out moment on this album is on Ceremony Of Shiva where the guitar style breaks from a heavy and aggressive to a melodic rhythm which is complimented by Nergal placing his vocals to work with the technical and choppy drumming. This makes the song have rhythm but not sound weak or boring like melodic death metal by still maintaining the aggressive and heavy elements of the drums and vocals. Starspawn and The Alchemist’s dream also so this well.

While Satanica is filled with many great moments on each song that are all great sounding, a lot of this album sounds to repetitious and trite/boring. On Ceremony Of Shiva, all that is before and after the melodic guitar solo is nothing special and doesn’t do all that much to compliment the song. After the Intro to Chant For Eschaton 2000 which is progressive, technical and one of the best sounding moments of the album, the song runs out of inspiration and produces boring death metal until it reuses the intro again. Many of songs on this album do that as well, have one standout segment, then slam the song into a brick wall destroying all that it had going. This breaks up the flow and replay of Satanica greatly. Although Satanica is filled with many great elements and about one or two great moments per each song, the lack of consistency and flow make this album easy to forget. With Thelma.6 and Zos Kia Kultus that take the formula of Satanica and get it right, there is little reason to listen to this album. In its own Satanica is not a bad album by any means, it just falls short of that good/memorable line and ends up being somewhere between average/good (if you’re a big fan of Behemoth) or forgettable/average if you’re just a casual fan of the band.