Black Demon Rites are a Swedish trio (Helge, Björn and Micke) that signed Misanthropic Generation Media’s roster in order to release their Motmänniskan-recording on tape. It’s the second release for that label, which focuses on the release of cassette-editions only, after På Fortvivlans Krön by Svartä; for the review on this tape, check out the update done on November 10th 2014. This cassette comes in an edition limited to forty eight copies only; half of them in white, and the other half in purple; and they come with a patch, by the way.
Motmänniskan consists of four tracks, and it lasts for more than an hour. And believe me if I say that Black Demon Rites are a band to be reckoned with! What these three guys bring is a massive, colossal, gargantuan (and so on) form of Sludge / Doom / Black Metal with an own face. …and it’s a very ugly, scarred face, believe me…
The long-stretched and rather monotone epics are extremely low-tuned and come with excellent vocal lines (though rare), psychedelic leads (also rather limited), a monolithic rhythm section (skull crushing!), some schizoid guitar shrieks and mesmerizing riffs. The nihilistic and minimal approach, and then I am referring to the repetitive melody-structures, is a surplus in this recording’s case, because it offers the listener the chance to enter a weird, haunting and ominous dimension of mostly obscure Aural Beauty. On top of it, the band does not eschew to experiment, though the elementary basics are totally inspired by tradition, focused on droning effects. Or: this is the most fitting definition for the sonic translation of Misanthropy! Hail!
The sound, finally, isn’t optimum at all. It might have been done little more perfected to really stand out. Especially the lack of clearly separating the individual players is a bad element, I mean, I would prefer to analyse the bass lines better, the depth of the guitar patterns, etc… I do not mind to hear some noisy elements, at least when there was the intention to create such sound. But here it must be considered a side-effect of old and unreliable equipment (cf. a Zoom H2-model). But it isn’t the worst production either, and it gives an idea of the primitive basics. Still it’s a pity, but the next effort will be better, more professionally produced and mixed, won’t it?!