Band: Semargl
Title: Ordo Bellictum Satanas
Label: Twilight Zone Records
Distribution: Bertus
Release date: March 12th 2010
Review: CD

Semargl are a Ukrainian formation that did release a few splendid albums before during the last lustrum (Attack On God, Satanogenesis, and Manifest; all available via Deathgasm). Unfortunately, it took almost three years before the audience could experience the fourth full length, but the actual release now is a fact!

Ordo Bellictum Satanas was produced by Melechesh’s Ashmedi and features guest appearances by several well-known Metal-colleagues, such as Jonny Maudling (Bal Sagoth, Darkness Ravening), Nera (Darzamat), Novy (ex-Behemoth / Devilyn / Dies Irae / Vader / Misteria / etc), and Iscariah (of Immortal / Amok / Grimfist / Wurdulak / Dead To This World / …-fame). The album has duration of about forty four minutes and comes with an overpowering and rough yet, at the same time, rather clean sound.

Opening ‘credo’ Sacrifice starts as an old school inspired up-tempo Black / Thrash’n’Roll Rocker - consider it a mixture of the origin-sounds of, for example, early Bathory, Possessed and Venom, with the ‘beer-and-babes’-mentality of Nocturnal Breed, Bewitched and Nifelheim. Several other tracks, like Possess, Dead To This World and Insanity (Intoxicated) (including a Behemoth / Thy Disease-spirit), are comparable, combining thrashing mid- to up-tempo rhythms and pounding (old stylish) riffs, and breathing the obscure spheres of the (early and mid-) eighties, yet with a pretty modern and avant-garde sound.
Some credos differ. Bellictum Satanas, for example, is a fast and bombastic Black-opus with massive orchestrations, a few female vocals (both melodic and classical ones) and a Gehenna-alike approach in tempo (-changes) and atmosphere. In Chaos, with some saxophone, sounds as a mixture of The Gathering (nineties-era) and Katatonia, while Total Krieg can be considered some Rammstein-meets-Ensoph-doomer. Some tracks do also contain electronic elements (like pseudo-Goth-song Revolution, or the outro, Vrangsinn), others are rather epic, and so on, and so on…

Indeed, this album is pretty varying, and in spite of being original, it is refreshing as well.

85/100

Ivan Tibos.