Dark Landscapes of My Imagination

The excessive romanticism of black metal as a genre, and the historic Norwegian scene in particular, have become something of an ace in the hole for devout followers to hang their collective cloak on. An aesthetic blueprint originally sparked by the creative, yet naive impulse of a bunch of kids, exhumed and haphazardly stitched back together in perpetuity by the creatively bankrupt and artistically truncated alike. Bedroom black metal - the mere mention evokes a menagerie of mental stimuli, ranging from mocking derision to impressive ingenuity whilst working on a shoestring budget. The wider reach of the internet has given unnecessary, faux credence to many a project that would have wallowed in irrelevance in the past, at best recorded over by superior ideas whilst said musician honed his or her craft on the path to eventually releasing something worth a damn.

Ensconced deep within the nether reaches of this pathetic subdivision of metal's most polarizing genre, the venerable Count Orlok holds court by his lonesome, accompanied only by his growing cadre of "projects," little more than repackaged black metal "starter kits" if you will. Propped up only by the most formulaic and standard genre conventions, their pretentious nomenclature runs the gamut between Tolkien buzzwords (Gargromog, Delduthling) to hackneyed Norwegian that is meaningless in context (Skrøpelighet). Even the supposed operator of not one, but two "labels" that simply distribute recordings on Bandcamp, this entire constellation of wretched inadequacy feels almost like an elaborate attempt at seeing how much bullshit one can get away with under the guise of underground subterfuge before being called out on the entire affair. Beelzebub appears to be one of the more established "bands" under Orlok's eminent Pyewacket Productions imprint, so it is as good a place as any to draw a bead on his dirty deeds.

To The Count's credit, Dark Landscapes of My Imagination is actually not the worst I've ever heard; that honour actually goes to Satanic Destroyer, once brought to us by Sledgehammer Autopsy's Matt Dorr. Dorr has clearly disowned that project, and to his credit he did manage to move on to penning decent material, albeit in an entirely different style. Orlok might have some potential capacity as a guitarist, but the fact that he seems to come up with everything else (visual presentation, song titles, etc.) before even writing a single bar proves that these bands are nothing more than exercises in kvlt ego-stroking, slapped together to meet the absolute minimum requirements for inclusion on Encyclopaedia Metallum, a pathetic practice that stretches the site's resources (and the staff's patience) making it difficult for legitimate bands to get their work processed in a timely manner. It's an atrocity that fools like this should be ashamed of.

Even more deplorable is Orlok's attempt at NSBM, clearly without doing any actual research or devoting time to understand the concept with his other project Vorghoth. This means that Beelzebub is not the worst that he has to offer, and in fact many of the riffs on Dark Landscapes of My Imagination do sound like early permutations of standard black metal ballistics. Sloppy tremolos confined to the same tired scales, tethered to the club-footed drum machine that doesn't even have the wherewithal to blast properly, their cheap platitudes feel like the sonic equivalent of a dollar store Halloween costume not unlike the cloak Orlok donned with Socialist pride for the all-important photoshoot. Two guest vocalists grace us with their presence, with James Watson delivering muffled, yet capable pulpit barking on "Black Dreams of War." I wouldn't be surprised if the better riffs on this thing were ganked from elsewhere, but the basic genre principles are accounted for on songs like "Eternal Winter," which takes one bog-standard note progression and runs it into the ground, mitigated by Lloyd Thomas' eloquent spoken word performance, rounding out the only songs featuring vocals. Elsewhere, variety comes at a premium, with the only marked deviation coming (yet again) courtesy of the drone/lemming mindset that demands acoustic padding somewhere on the record, in this case the vacuously-titled "Shadows of Shelob's Night." It's the same two bars repeated for roughly two minutes, interwoven with a blowing breeze that sounds like someone literally blowing into the mic. Touching.

It would be too easy to pick apart Dark Landscapes of My Imagination on a songwriting level alone, since it really is little more than two riffs per song, or more like one riff played a step up/down. These truly aren't songs in the traditional sense, they are a smattering of ideas stitched together without any ear for nuance, brutality or melodic sensibility. At best, these feel like haphazard backing tracks recorded on Audacity in order to practice over, and earn the album its only points. Sound is appreciably clear at least, and nothing here feels like it gels unsatisfactorily with the remainder. Still, the programmed drums deserve a more patient and creative mind behind them, instead of this copy-paste ride cymbal/snare pattern job that cyclically drones into irrelevance before even the first song ends.

Count Orlok doesn't appear to comprehend his own delusion, although that sounds par for the course all things considered. For a man that threw a hissy fit over the fact that the claims of his real, legal name being Quiet Thunder were dismissed with prejudice, his actions feel like the antithesis of the Devil may care attitude his self-proclaimed forebears are revered for. The parched and punchy delivery of Dark Landscapes of My Imagination doesn't feel as dangerous or coffin dust-enveloped as he was likely hoping for. In all seriousness, this isn't a finished product, none of this cretin's "bands" are. They are the end result of a confused, deluded dipshit deciding to play dress up after trawling Youtube for a weekend, basing his entire approach on the fact that black metal requires the lowest amount of resources to pull off semi-convincingly. What makes Orlok particularly egregious is his sheer brazen nature. One may infer a lack of shame, but the ADHD nature of these projects along with the fact that he continues to create more (Delduthling, Krigskygge and Wrothghuul all within the last week!) means that any criticism will fall upon unsurprisingly deaf ears. This is why black metal is not taken seriously. Kvlt kids that whine like the children they are when put on blast for not being the stone cold killers they like to play make-believe as. Artistic license only yields so much slack when the veracity of the "art" itself is in question. Iron Wizard would be ashamed of this.