Deliverance

It was so easy to attack “Lord Satanael” back in Godkiller’s heyday. Yes, he was “the proverbial spoilt rich kid, whose excruciating life led him to crave revenge through evil black-metal”, or “oh, how would he be summoning the dark lord beneath, with his daddy’s chauffeur, in white gloves and shades, waiting for him by the family’s Bentley, next to Frozen Citadel studio”, etc, etc, amidst other nice examples of raving mad apocrypha.

After the “The end of the world” album had received such an incredible press bashing, one really couldn’t believe this “Lord” would have the nerve to come back, even though it was obvious he had been an easy prey of negative hype injustice – it was sheer prejudice of the 1st degree: “What? You’re from Monte Carlo and you play evil BM? Give him 1 star just for the studio time…”. Well… First of all, there was a 2-year gap in between that misunderstood album and “Deliverance” (which, by the way, was recorded 10 years ago, now, right?). Those 2 years were crucial for BM evolution and maturing; it was a time of mind-opening within the circles of dark grim (un)reality. Godkiller definitely pictured “themselves” embarking in such a voyage. “Deliverance” (as the title suggests) was a serious and extremely professional musical move into the new world of heavy music, for the brave new century. At first listening, comparisons with the then recent Samael abounded, on account of the techno approach, yet seemingly forgetting that even such outfield people like Celtic Frost, Beherit, Ulver (“Vanity/Nemesis”, “Drawing down the moon” and “The marriage of heaven and hell”), or that year’s Mayhem, for that matter, were all enamored with the techno beat (of course, not on a merely danceable approach, that goes without saying).

The remarkably well –structured songs create an inner narrative flow, providing the unity that was so often missing in many a modern “concept” BM opus; apart from that, the different layers of composition have been unmistakably taken care of, rhythmic tracks perfectly nested underneath avalanches of sensibly played keyboards (to what great musical effect!), crowned with appropriately chosen passages from the “Good Book”… now here’s another move most post-BM purists would never forgive Lord S. For quoting the Bible so that you may convey dismal feelings and premonition of darker days coming for the human individual and his kind seemed to look “far-fetched” and “inadequate” for someone who had once claimed to be the most evil person in … Monte Carlo! It’s no surprise nowadays, that truly talented people like him had to cross their Rubicon on account of “selling their black souls” to …artistic and professional commitment – off the bat, I can think of my compatriots Moonspell, to say the least! So, Lord Satanael was being crucified again, this time for reasons quite dissimilar from those that had first led him to be ridiculed by the underground intelligentsia.

“Deliverance” “suffered” from everything that raised an improbable schism among the metal fraternity – BM records with a good production, fine playing and witty choice of words couldn’t simply be accepted as valid , even if they represented their authors’ stylistic apex, a strange contradiction for a genre that stood for the human own majestic creation in the first place – and, honestly, as far as pompous and masterful instrumentation goes, there isn’t any significant gap between works of, say, Emperor or Limbonic Art, and that of Godkiller. 10 years after, I just felt it was more than time to do it some deserved justice.