Inter Armas Silent Leges

I'll tell you right off the bat - symphonic black metal doesn't do a thing for me. The farting horns and military drum march sort of stuff over death metal riffing is a huge no-no for me. It's not that symphonic black metal doesn't have its place within the genre, just bear in mind that this review is from someone who is not a huge fan of it.

Nonetheless, Nephesh seems to be Christian black metal's answer to the overblown pomposity of Dimmu Borgir's music from about 1998 or so onwards. In fact, it's almost a damn-near photocopy of "Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia" or "Death Cult Armageddon", but obviously with some different lyrical content. Everything is here and accounted for - massive symphonies, epic choirs, power metal solos, death metal technicality, keyboards, and of course some deeper black metal rasps just to make it still fall under the genre.

If this is your kind of thing, I guarantee you'll love it. Every track is bombastic in the extreme, although seems to lack the production values that bands like Dimmu Borgir can afford. Not to say it's bad production by any means - far from it. But the sound isn't quite as crystal-clear as Dimmu's.

As for the tracks, they all seem to blur together for me. "Sentence Darkness" I suppose is the standout - the choral intro is well-done, and the mid-section is about as heavy as this band gets, with some nice blasts and thrash riffs going on. But at times, one has to really remind themselves that this isn't Dimmu - the songs sound so identical in structure and overall tone that it's a little uncanny.

I suppose if it's your thing, you'll dig it. To me, it's just barely black metal. Though the technical skill is there, the grandiose nature of the album is exhausting after long listens.