Immortal – All Shall Fall
released October 6, 2009 on Nuclear Blast
It is very rare that an album comes along with the entire package, even rarer when it is a band’s first output in over 7 years. However, that’s exactly what we’ve got with Immortal‘s comeback album: All Shall Fall.
The first part of fulfilling the complete package is having the artwork. The cover of this album represents the sound so well that you don’t even have to listen to get to know it. To me, it looks like it is meant to be the gates of Blashyrkh (which are actually mentioned in the closing track), the land that lyricist Demonaz created to appear in many of the band’s lyrics. Next, you’ve gotta have songwriting to warrant the beautiful artwork. Here, the band deploys some of their most interesting tracks, with the major/minor modulation on tracks 1 and 4 (maybe some power metal influence?), the latter featuring an almost celtic-sounding intro on a semi-clean guitar.
If you’re going to write some really amazing songs, you must also be able to play them. There is never any doubt of Immortal‘s musicianship here, although I would hope this wasn’t a worry for anyone, given the 44 years of total recording history in the band. They never go too over the top, as well. The blast beats are not there for the sake of being blast beats, there are never any pointless wanking solos, and the bass parts meld well with everything else, as opposed to being a showing of new bassist Apollyon’s (Aura Noir, Dødheimsgard) technical abilities.
Last but not least, the production is absolutely stunning. Everything is clear as a bell, with nothing taking the spotlight. It really shines on “Unearthly Kingdom”‘s intro, with a haunting choir and orchestra opening up and decaying into one of the coolest guitar tones I have ever heard. Abbath nailed getting his axe to sound good on this whole album, exploiting a perfect distribution of the low-end and your typical high-pitched black metal guitars. I wish I knew what equipment was used for both the amplifying and recording.
It really doesn’t get much better than this album. Generally speaking, black metal is a tough genre to convey multiple emotions through. Usually, bands are fairly monotonous, only really bringing a creepy side to their music. On the other end of the spectrum, you have the gems like this that manage to stay within the confines of the music but still can bring you anger, sadness, despair, and hope. That is what really makes this one of the best of the year. It is an emotional roller coaster.
A Best of 2009 pick!
FCC OK
Try *1*, 2, *4*, 5, *7*
01. All Shall Fall
02. The Rise of Darkness
03. Hordes to War
04. Norden on Fire
05. Arctic Swarm
06. Mount North
07. Unearthly Kingdom
Rating: 
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