It’s a rare pleasure for me to obtain an album from the southern reaches of Ontario, even rarer that it happens to be black metal. Though, in the past I have been burned by the hopes of my home-land and home-province providing something decent. You see, black metal is something of a rarity in the great north. Experiencing anything outside the reaches of commercial giants such as Dimmu Borgir or Behemoth is sometimes a near impossibility outside of the internet. When one is to find a black metal band, it usually is something so incredibly underground that your unlikely to get something listenable (I don’t even wish to count how many times I’ve been completely disappointed by Quebec-based black metal bands). So, when I received a copy of Panzerfaust’s Jehovah-Jireh: The Divine Anti-logos I braced for the absolute worst.
My initial reaction to this album could very well sum up this entire review in an instant. After receiving it in the mail, I popped it into my computer – by the second track I’d begun to state to my wife how “Oh, this is good black metal!” This was probably not something to proclaim after experiencing fantastic groups like Dark Fortress, Fell Voices, and Svartsyn but I stand by it. Panzerfaust is good; Panzerfaust is insanely good.
I find it incredibly strange that a band so out of sight managed to do away with the ‘in-the-box” mentality of black metal recording. Panzerfaust seems to have just thrown the faulty notions of KVLT (thankfully) out the window – providing a clear, but still heavy as hell, quality. For this, immense respect is given. Long have I waited for black metal to up the quality and move on, Panzerfaust manages to bring extreme metal a step forward.
Musically, you can expect the sharp shrieking tones this genre is accustomed too, the sort that implies the impending or growing negativity and rage. The band does manage to add many progressive moments as well though, with plenty of ‘calm before the storm’ moments to compliment the proceeding madness - build ups, marches and sinister arpeggios are abound.
The biggest credit I’ll give to Panzerfaust is that I actually understood and paid attention to the lyrics. The sum of vocals on Jehovah-Jireh: The Divine Anti-logos almost sounds like blasphemous verses taken from some forgotten gospel – which rather effectively reflects modern society, of course (doesn’t it always?). The vocals which carry these lyrics are fantastic, not once bordering on garbled insanity – though remaining relatively lose in structure per tradition. Panzerfaust does manage to throw in plenty of variety with occasional layering too.
If you’re like me, and looking for something that cares about the quality of its output but doesn’t compromise the integrity of its genre – look no further. Panzerfaust’s Jehovah-Jireh: The Divine Anti-logos isn’t something any black metal fan (especially a Canadian one) wants to miss.
