The title cannot be reiterated enough – even if you like the teaser material for this album, under no circumstances should you buy it from the label. It’s the work of a man who pulled the rug from underneath a genuine artist’s feet to make a cash-grab, and it should not be supported in any way. Bart here may have the legal basis for carrying on with the name, but that certainly doesn’t make him the honest actor in the drama surrounding this album. Should anyone think I’m being unfair by being prejudiced against this release for the drama and not solely focusing on the music, all I have to say is that bringing this external drama up is necessary in judging the album as it would not exist without the drama and like any album its contents have been affected by the context it was constructed in. It’s a lazy cash-grab that truly sounds like just that – it’s a cobbled together load of rubbish that bears no meaningful resemblance to anything approaching a Batushka album.

The common thread that runs throughout is that the material is entirely derivative, lacking any identity or memorability. There is not an original bone in this album’s body; its boldest idea is the mix of choral and harsh vocals, which are ripped off from Litourgiya. The guitarwork is taken from a few sources of inspiration – the astonishingly crappy groove riffs and chugs that pop up from time to time being one example. The unending tremolo throughout the songs makes a lot of the guitarwork here sound like cast off/riffless Nightbringer or Litourgiya material. There are also some references to less riffy symphonic black metal acts, and there are some thrashier riffs at points, most notably on the track ‘Utrenia’ but it’s mostly tremolo-heavy, riffless fluff. Overall Hospodi listens like the work of a coattail riding second-string band with no identity of its own that apes a bunch of different sounds, one of which happens to be Litourgiya. For the most part this doesn’t listen like a Batushka album at all, or a development from Litourgiya, though clearly the band is trying hard to evoke its atmosphere and aesthetics with some very surface-level and forced references to it musically.

Another common factor in the material is that it is almost entirely mid-paced. The band never really picks up the pace or slows down to a drudging crawl; they’re entirely content to sit at a very uniform ‘not really fast but not really slow’ tempo. By doing this the music is erased of any potential points of contrast – there is no chance for a crushing, doom-like passage or a much faster, blast-filled section here. Variation in tempo is not a must for good music but with music this shallow the last thing it needs is to have another layer of potential variation stripped from it. It makes the music even more flat than it would have been, as there is no attempt to alter the mood using the tempo.

Making matters worse is that the songwriting is abysmal. Many of the songs here feature big stretches devoted to building up to something, usually in the form of tremolo and chords atop of double bass and choral vocals borrowed from Litourgiya. The first problem with this is that these build-ups lead to absolutely nothing – in place of climaxes the band routinely delivers an anti-climax in the form of a weak groovy/chugging/slower riff or quiet sections with faint choral vocals and guitars ringing in the background. This has the effect of making the songs feel like parts of the cutting room floor stapled together in the same way over and over again, as opposed to pieces that were actually written as one from start to finish. The second is that the band simply cannot find a way to increase the intensity of their music beyond making it louder with more tremolo, more choral vocals, and more double bass. The music never actually feels more aggressive during these moments, and as a result the buildups that the band spend so much time doing don’t even feel like they’re building up to anything, they listen more like an idea stretched far past the point of being remotely fresh. Tracks will start and end at seemingly arbitrary points, as it feels as if there is no reason why something is happening within them. The tracks don’t build up to anything meaningful, they don’t end in a satisfying way and taken as a whole they don’t even flow properly or feel like a complete journey. This is just about every track on the album, with only ‘Powieczerje’ and ‘Polunosznica’ really feeling like they were written with any care or attention paid to them.

The uniform tempo and equally uniform (lack of) songwriting highlights the next big issue with the album, which is that it is unbelievably copy-paste and very short on ideas. Once you’ve heard one song here you’ve basically heard them all, as the band has nothing to offer beyond rejected Litourgiya non-riffs, Eastern Orthodox-inspired choral vocals, one style of black metal rasp and some utterly flat meandering passages that give way to anti-climactic points, all at one tempo. Ideas get drawn out to the point of becoming stale within songs as the band clearly have no idea how to develop these ideas, and across the album the same tropes get repeated over and over meaning that songs will bleed together as the album wears on and the listener’s mind wanders as they wait for a song to end. Needless to say the songs are far, far too long for how flat and musically bankrupt they really are, and just a few tracks in you’ll be reaching for the pause button. This kills the atmosphere the band spend so much time trying to evoke, and while listening you’ll struggle to feel anything from the music because nothing about its composition or substance is inspiring enough to do that.

This is a miserable failure of a release. It’s obvious when listening who the brains behind Litourgiya was – sure that release was flawed but the regression displayed here is stunning. What few ideas the music presents are inferior copies of other people’s work that then get drawn out to oblivion across every song and the album as a whole. On top of all of this, there is no reason for it to exist beyond cashing in on the clout of an idea that wasn’t Bart’s at all. If you want a new Batushka album, go and buy Панихида, and stay miles away from this, because it’s a waste of time for anybody who chooses to listen to it. This is nothing but an effortless cash-grab; a lazy work that was cobbled together to get another release with the Batushka name on it out of the door. It’s vapid, shallow, soulless and thoroughly devoid of anything interesting.

It’s an embarrassment.

Manifestations 2000-2001 was one of two compilations released by DsO back in 2008, along with Manifestations 2002. It is comprised of material previously released on a couple of splits and a V/A compilation from the early part of the ’00s, as the title suggests, with the songs coming from two distinct recording sessions. It’s an interesting look at the pre-Aspa phase of DsO’s career – a time before they had truly found their sound or any notability in the metal world at large – and despite being overshadowed by its more notable and consistent sibling, is still of note to fans as it is a neatly packaged collection of material that would otherwise be scattered across multiple obscure releases.

The music itself is very typical of this phase of DsO’s career, to the extent that this material could easily have fit onto Inquisitors of Satan. It draws heavily from the likes of Darkthrone (mostly Transilvanian Hunger) insofar as it relies on the generally speedy repetition of melodic riffs atop a straight-forward blast beat-driven drum performance, but the nods to thrash in some of the riffs and the alternation between these and more typical second-wave inspired material points to Gorgoroth as a notable influence too. The vocals are very redolent of these influences – Shaxul’s unchanging rasp lies somewhere between Nocturno Culto and Hat and fit the music well. There are a lot of high quality riffs and they’re strung together well, they don’t dwell in one place for too long with songs consistently pushing forward (which is needed when every song breaks the 6 minute mark) and the band does well to craft an atmosphere with such basic and well-worn tools, a testament to the quality of the music.

As stated these 6 tracks are from two recording sessions – the first two come from an early 2001 session while the last four come from an early 2000 recording session. This is relevant as there is a very clear divide between the two; not so much in style but in recording quality. The first two tracks feature a typically clear, cold sound with prominently mixed snares and a somewhat delay-heavy guitar tone – very reminiscent of a crisper, higher fidelity version of Inquisitors of Satan‘s sound as well as the sound on Pentagram. The latter four meanwhile feature lower fidelity, noisier production with clickier, thinner drums and similarly thinner, hazier guitars, though these tracks ultimately sound much cleaner than anything from Infernal Battles which came out a few months after their recording. The former plays more to the strengths of the music by giving it more punch and clarity, while the more atmospheric production of the latter 4 tracks makes them less effective by doing the opposite.

The basic problems here are the same with everything else the band were doing before Mikko Aspa joined the fold and Si Monumentum… came out, in that while the material is good it isn’t that remarkable in the end, with a distinct lack of identity and therefore memorability. It also suffers from the same curse those first two albums do, in that there’s not much reason to listen to it outside of historical curiosity. What followed this and related material set new standards for what could be achieved by the band and modern BM bands in general, making them immediately less relevant on a purely musical level. Another problem is that the compilation is incomplete; DsO’s side of their split with Clandestine Blaze from around the same time is nowhere to be found here, which is a pity as those tracks are also exclusive to that split and stylistically would fit right in with this crop of tracks.

Despite its incompleteness and derivative nature, it’s a solid collection of tracks – a worthwhile curio for fans of the band, but only if they actually enjoy the first phase of their career; those who don’t need not apply, obviously. Those who thoroughly enjoy either of their first two albums (especially Inquisitors) will find plenty to enjoy here, and for those who haven’t heard either of their first two albums this is worth a few listens to get a sense of where the band were coming from with SMRC. Not essential by any means, but good.

In general, Dimmu Borgir is a divisive entity. As well as receiving praise for their symphonic take on black metal, they’ve earned scorn in several circles (generally those of a more purist persuasion) for going against the genre’s ethos; a band with the intent of making relatively accessible and polished metal draped with superficial black metal influence. However, these same individuals will routinely point to For All Tid and its successor Stormblåst as being the definitive Dimmu Borgir albums. Frankly I don’t see it this way at all – as shallow and safe their later albums are, they are least competently executed, polished and well-crafted, which is more than can be said of their first two albums. This in particular easily stands as the worst Dimmu Borgir album, and while it isn’t an abomination it certainly isn’t worthy of its classic status. It has its moments but it almost seems as if the band stumbled upon these good ideas by chance given the general sloppiness and poor musical execution displayed on this album. It reeks of inexperience and overshooting one’s mark.

The production on this album is very poor – though lo-fi production is a common trope of the genre, there’s a certain degree of intelligence to giving an album raw production. If we look at say, Transilvanian Hunger, that album sounds as though the songs were written and performed specifically so the production can add to and complement the album’s atmosphere, with everything being drenched in static as to make the drums, vocals and riffs sound otherworldly and cryptic. The issue here is that like a lot of amateur black metal musicians, Dimmu Borgir made a serious blunder regarding the sound: the mistaking of a bad sound for a raw one. The guitars are overly thin and gunky, sounding sterile and vague all at once, as well as being too quiet. The drums are inconsequential in the mix, being a thin hissing click that blends into the background. The keyboards sound cheap, like a bad ’90s video game soundtrack. The bass and vocals are both too loud, with both obscuring the riffs with the continuous plugging of the former and the all-consuming reverb of the latter. As a result of this the album comes across as dated, unlike the timeless classics this band’s fellow countrymen were churning out around this time.

The band plays a friendlier and softer take on the black metal sound, with highly melodic riffs that don’t carry a lot of aggression and a notable keyboard presence that serve to sweeten up the package. However, despite this being an album built around guitar melodies few of them tend to be memorable, much to the detriment of the album. Partially this is because of the aforementioned obscuring of the riffs by the surrounding instruments but mainly this is down to them simply not being that well written or captivating. The same can be said of the keyboards, which are sadly underused on this album, despite being present throughout. They too play largely forgettable and uninteresting lines; which isn’t helped by the fact that they are simply an undercurrent to the rest of the music, one which can be ignored most of the time. The vocals are serviceable croaky black metal rasps, even if as stated they are mixed too loudly. The drumming however is simply awful, being uncertain and out of time. The drummer simply cannot blast for any given length of time, and completely wrecks any consistency this band might have achieved in a song.

The atmosphere on this album is an odd one; there’s a very distant and melancholic feel to some of the keyboard lines and melodies, particularly those in the title track or ‘Under korpens vinger’, which are the only songs which consistently retain a mood. The rest of the music, despite being fairly overwrought in aesthetic, evokes no real mood at all due to little meaningful use of the keyboards and not playing much worthwhile content to begin with. It is therefore no surprise to find that these two are the best songs on the album, along with the 5 minute intro ‘Det Nye Riket’ with its simple yet effective piano lines and sombre and low spoken word passages. ‘Glittertind’ is another clear highlight due to both its quality and it being an instrumental, as it can therefore escape the overly loud mood-wrecking vocal performance. It should be stated however that these are highlights relative to the rest of the album, and aren’t in any way standouts in the pantheon of black metal or this band’s own discography.

The real area where this album falls is the frankly nonsensical structuring and pacing of the songs. All of the songs on this album, even its standouts, seemingly meander about for the majority of their duration. The band generally shoehorn in a lot of differing passages at once, from the keys to rapid, blasting passages to bizarrely bouncing punk riffs and dissonant, traditional black metal riffs which don’t mix with the keys or the mood of the album at all – there are even synthesised flutes and other such effects that sound comical and ruin any atmosphere the music might otherwise have. Despite throwing several ideas into every song the band simply lack the expertise and vision to execute any of them with a particular level of finesse or compose any structured songs out of them. The performances feel uncertain and haphazard, as do the transitions from one passage to another. Songs never really reach a satisfying conclusion or resolve in any meaningful way and tend towards being two-dimensional, with no real intense or climactic passages to speak of. The band never gets their act together outside of a few solid songs, which are still marred by most of the aforementioned flaws.

The main arguments for this album appear to be derived from metaphors and aesthetics rather than any sort of meaningful musical elements. The songs wander about like someone who’s lost – but any sort of memorability and meaning to the majority of the material is lost due to the arcane structuring of the songs. The production may be hazy but it also sounds terrible and actually works against the mood in a lot of cases with its easily obscured guitars and poor mix. There’s almost nothing in the way of musical texture due to the overly sparse and underused keys as well as the forgettable riffing and the all too vague guitar tone. The wonky performances, particularly the drumming, leave the listener feeling as confused and uncertain of the album as the band obviously was while performing. It is clear that a lot of the more lacklustre material here could have been fairly solid songs had they been written by competent musicians (and similarly the decent songs here could have been made great) but any quality is simply lost in translation here. There’s better wandering and melodic black metal out there; don’t waste your time with this.