there are albums that, when they came out, didn’t get what they deserved, and there are albums that simply got lost in the flow of time through no one’s fault. Patriarchs of Evil belongs to a third category: it was released in April 2018, got the praise it deserved from those who heard it, and then… it just stayed there. As if waiting for you to find it.
VARATHRON from Ioannina are among the most important and least recognized names of the Greek black metal scene. If Rotting Christ is the name the world knows and Necromantia the name connoisseurs respect, Varathron are the band loved by those who have really dug deep into the subject. More cult, darker, more evil — and with an album like this one, more relevant than ever.
Patriarchs of Evil is their sixth full-length and according to many their best since Walpurgisnacht (1995). The line-up for the first time stayed stable from the previous album — and it shows. You have a band where each member knows what the one next to him is doing, and that cohesion gives the compositions a consistency that not all of their albums have.
The first three tracks — “Tenebrous”, “Into the Absurd”, “Luciferian Mystical Awakening” — are among the best they have ever written. “Into the Absurd” specifically has a boldness in the riffs that recalls death/thrash of the Messiah era, and it sounds completely natural within their sound — it’s not an introduction, it’s part of their DNA. “Luciferian Mystical Awakening” goes Scandinavian melodic black metal and pulls it off without losing itself.
Necroabyssious — Stefanos Karasavvas to the rest of us — is here too the reason the album has this distinct color. His voice is extreme even for a black metal band — brutal, pure, with a Greek accent that doesn’t try to hide and gives the sound the cult character you can’t manufacture if you don’t have it from the start.
The production is polished and modern — cleaner than the 90s, but without losing weight and “grit”, as someone who wrote about this album aptly put it. It’s not the type of production that tries to hide weaknesses — it’s the type that lets the compositions speak.
- This one is also worth checking out: THE MAGUS present the boxset edition of «Daemonosophia»
If there’s something that doesn’t work perfectly: from the middle toward the end the album sags a little, loses its pace somewhat. It’s not enough to pull you out of the album, but it’s enough to notice. “Ouroboros Dweller” though closes the album in a way that erases every complaint — epic, dark, as if the temperature rises in the last ten minutes.
If you haven’t heard it, now is a good time. If you’ve heard it and forgot it, it’s an even better time to put it on again. VARATHRON are one of the few bands that deserve to be called legends — and this album is the proof.
Rating: Very good — an album that doesn’t age. Released: April 27, 2018 | Label: Agonia Records Websites: Facebook | Bandcamp
