u/VO0OIID

American progressive / technical death metal band, also under the umbrella of “dissonant death metal”. Other than just being good, there are a few unique points about this band. First of all, it’s the only metal band I’ve ever heard to use musical instrument theremin. Actually, it’s the only band to use theremin that I’ve heard period. For those who never heard of it, it’s a musical instrument that is being played by waving hands in the air, creating certain ‘electronic effects’. Second, while a lot of other dissonant bands tend to lean into dark sound and lyrical themes (including some esoteric and occult, etc.), Gigan goes into drastically different direction with some crazy sci-fi space psychedelic trip stuff, in just really stands out. Starting from their second album they also developed their own unique production style, you really can’t confuse them with anybody else. If you are into stuff like Gorguts, Mitochondrion, Portal and Ulcerate, then Gigan is an absolute must have, personally I think Gigan blows away Ulcerate by very far.

Angelvs XIII is a song from eleventh “I Loved You At Your Darkest” (2018). And honestly – it’s one of those that I can’t remember at all what they were about without giving it another listen, and also easily one of the major weak points of ILYAYD album, it’s just a really uninteresting song, a total filler of a track. And while I wouldn’t say it’s horrible, there are some short, decent ideas, but for Behemoth level – unapologetically weak; the track as a whole doesn’t click. I don’t even remember when was the last time I’ve heard it, and I probably wouldn’t listen to it again any time soon if it wasn’t for this post. Even song title kinda feels like low effort.

Angelvs XIII

Today we will be talking about a deepcut that mostly only the “Satanica” (1999) CD owners know about – its two hidden tracks.

First of all, when I relisten to “Satanica” I usually stop at Chant For Eschaton 2000, and don’t go into hidden tracks, since it messes with the flow and overall sense of completion/conclusion to the album, however, this stuff is interesting enough to talk about separately.

Believe it or not, 33 is a short drum’n’bass song, and let me tell you, that’s some most wicked and haunting drum’n’bass you will ever hear! Also, the melody is rather unobvious, it’s a not that easy to remember, might get over your head. Honestly, I wish it was twice as long, 1 minute is just not enough.

99 is a proper metal track, but unlike the main “Satanica” tracklist, it’s a very simplistic mid-tempo song. The main stand-out feature is vocals, though – they are heavily computed-edited, ultra deep and low. The song is under 2 minutes, but honestly, any longer and it would have been a bit too much anyway. Computer grows will work better for their next album bonus track, Sathanas (Sarcófago Cover), but here – it’s just ok at best. Ok song overall, but I like drum’n’bass one more)

So, have you ever heard those or at least one of them? 93 seems to be more well known.

Hidden track 33

Hidden track 93

Blackest Ov The Black is a song from sixth album “Zos Kia Cultus (Here And Beyond)” (2002). I’ve noticed it tends to be one of the more popular songs of the album, even though it’s not a single and was never played live. Stylistically though there isn’t anything stand-out’ish about this song at all, sounds like a very typical “Zos Kia Cultus” experience (with a bit of extra melody that you don’t really hear on other albums, not specifically like that), especially similar to songs like Here And Beyond and Modern Ïconoclasts… it’s a lot better than them, though. Personally, I’m not crazy about it, it’s far from my most favorite songs of the record, but it’s definitely a very solid track nevertheless.

What do you think about this one?

Blackest Ov The Black

Transmigrating Beyond Realms Ov Amenti is a song from ninth album “Evangelion” (2009). Amenti is the realm of the dead in Ancient Egypt mythology. This might be a bit of a fun one to discuss, since a lot of people highlight this song for its really intense technical death metal intro… and then that’s it, the rest of the song is not to be discussed) Personally, I would also add the very ending to the table, with angry Nergal yelling “Jerusalem is falling”, which I sometimes find slightly comical for some reason (especially with Nergal’s real name being Adam), but the rest of the song is just... ok, good. Ok, tech death moments around guitar solos are also a bit of a highlight. Absolutely nothing to complain here about, but I feel like most of this song kinda just exists, and it is good cos it’s heavy and brutal, but there really isn’t anything else to say. It’s classic 2000s Behemoth style track, and it sounds great while listening to the entire album as a whole, but it’s far from the most interesting ones, imho. Just good, with some occasional hype for it’s awesome instrumental intro. Good, and really angry and pissed-off, but not what makes “Evangelion” actually great.

Don’t get me wrong though – “Evangelion” is my third favorite Behemoth album, so I held almost all of it in high regard, and it was easily one of the very best metal albums of late 00s / early 10s. I'm just trying to be critical here.

Do you agree? Or is your take on this song completely different?

Transmigrating Beyond Realms Ov Amenti

The Deathless Sun is a song from twelfth album “Opvs Contra Natvram” (2022). I think it’s safe to say it’s the main single of the album – a song that most of the people, Behemoth fans or not, are going to judge/associate this album with. In a way, big chorus motive is somewhat similar to songs from next album, The Shit Ov God and Lvciferaeon. Overall, I think The Deathless Sun is a decent enough song, however, it’s a bit too over-polished for my taste, and it’s probably the song where a bit underwhelming production might be the most noticeable. So yeah, I think it’s just ok. Nothing to hate here, nothing really much to praise either. I like majority of second part the most, since is partially instrumental and doesn’t have both chorus and verse sections in it. Chorus is the most memorable element of the song, though.

So, what do you think about The Deathless Sun? Good? Bad? Or maybe somewhere in a middle?

Also, the music video has absurdly wide screen) Like wtf even is this?! Is it supposed to be watched by human species, lol, my eyes are not that far away from each other. Video kinda sucks, anyway.

The Deathless Sun

And we’ve done 2/3 of Behemoth discography, congrads! If you want to know more, here are the stats:

>!Sventevith: 3!<
>!Grom: 6!<
>!Pandemonic Incantations: all of it!<
>!Satanica: 7!<
>!Thelema: 5!<
>!Zos Kia Cultus: 7!<
>!Demigod: 6!<
>!The Apostasy: 3!<
>!Evangelion: 4!<
>!The Satanist: 7!<
>!ILYAYD: 7!<
>!OCN: 8!<
>!TSOG: 7!<
>!Pre-debut songs: 9 + first demo!<
>!Non-album songs: 8!<
>!Covers: 13!<

Christgrinding Avenue is a final song of eighth album “The Apostasy” (2007). It’s easily one of the heaviest and angriest songs on the album and, in a way, is somewhat similar to how Behemoth closed “Zos Kia Cultus (Here And Beyond)” (2002) with Heru Ra Ha: Let There Be Mïght – just leave the heaviest thing for the very end. The band actively played Christgrinding Avenue live during “The Apostasy” era tours, but I don’t think they played it live ever since. The song also features an instrumental outro, which somewhat mirrors Rome 64 C.E. intro for opening track Slaying The Prophets Ov Isa, only slower, or maybe even can be compared to slower parts in non-album track Qadosh. This is also the song that ‘got the band into the court’, since Nergal was giving short speeches about bible before playing it live, including someone filming him tearing the bible, if I remember correctly. It was far from the last court cases for Behemoth, but I believe it was probably the first, and the best known one. You know, before Nergal decided he can do it for sport)

There isn’t that much to add, really – it’s just a really mean song. Way back I used to think it might be the best one on the album (or close to it), but I changed my opinion since then, kinda. So, what do you guys make of this one?

Christgrinding Avenue

Starspawn is a song from fourth album “Satanica” (1999), and it’s the only song of the record with lyrics being written by Nergal… Which is especially curious, since lyrics of this song mention Solaris, and looks like Nergal might be referring to it as “Planet Satan”… You know, that Solaris that is a psychological sci-fi story by Polish writer, which was later adapted into a movie in USSR, and a few decades later was remade by Hollywood. That’s a very unexpected crossover from mister Nergal!

The song itself is quite fast-paced and intense. I would even say that there are some minor similarities to Christians To The Lions from the next album, or at least endings of these two songs are almost identical (ironically, they are also both track 6 on their albums). Behemoth used to play Starspawn live during “Satanica” era, but I don’t think they played it ever since.

So, what do you guys think of this one? I think it’s a bit underrated, especially considering how non-stop Christians To The Lions is being played live, while I don’t think Starspawn is much behind, if at all, maybe even the other way around.

Starspawn

And since the band has put Solaris on a table here, I would like to share my hot take: 1973 version by Tarkovsky is just not good, especially since first half of the movie (which is almost 3 hours long!) is completely pointless and 100% irrelevant to the plot, and the rest is just not as good as a more modern take, including in terms of acting skills, music (one of the very best soundtracks I’ve heard in a film for sure), lighting – just everything. I really liked his other film, Stalker (1979), but this one kinda sucks, at least comparing to 2002 version with George Clooney and Natascha McElhone (and was produced by James Cameron). I know that Stanisław Lem, author of the book (1961) utterly hated both movies. By the way, American remake was also very technologically advanced for its age – for example, visual representation of Solaris was the most technologically advanced use of CGI to that date. Also, overall atmosphere and feel of the movie is just completely unmatched, which is probably another reason why I wasn’t able to enjoy Soviet version. Anyway, I’m a big believer in 2002 version, it’s just great.

Intro and The Dark Forest (Cast Me Your Spell) are opening tracks of their second album “Grom” (1996). First of all, the intro – it’s really good. Builds up anticipation and tension quite seriously, a simplistic intro really well done. I’m not overly too big on “Grom” in general, and I used to like it more before, and lost some of the interest later, but damn if The Dark Forest (Cast Me Your Spell) is not an excellent song. Really cool fast, blastbeaty parts, nice acoustic guitar riffs, great guitar solo, it’s one of two “Grom” songs not only to mention Nergal’s cleans, but also has clean female vocals by guest singer Celina. Even ultra-simplistic, short instrumental outro is on fire. This song is just very good! As simple as that. Gem.

Intro

The Dark Forest (Cast Me Your Spell)

Conquer All is a song from seventh album “Demigod” (2004). It’s one of the biggest Behemoth’s hits and also one of the fasters song to be ever done by them: according to Nergal, it was all a quick inspiration while already working in a studio – it took him one hour to compose the song, and another hour to fully record it with the band, so it literary took them two hours to get from absolutely nothing to having one of their main bangers fully ready.

And I would probably say it’s their very best song ever. There are just so many great aspects about it, and not a single second of filler or mediocracy. And the guitar solo! Absolutely amazing! And such a cornerstone track, even in terms of overall band mentality.

This was also their third (proper) music video ever, as well as first attempt at introducing some kind of temporary mask for Nergal.

Conquer All is one of two mandatory live songs from “Demigod” and, interestingly enough, they play live chorus slower than studio version. It’s probably also worth mentioning that drum beat during guitar solo – in studio version it sounds almost like a really fast stop-go type of thing, while in live versions it’s perfectly clear Inferno is just bashing those double floor bass drums non-stop, like throughout most of the song.

On a down side, I’m sure at least some of you have heard about one riff similarity with thrash band Anthrax, and their song Be All, End All… Obviously, there are some riff similarities, however that’s what it is – a similarity, and of a just single riff, the songs themselves have pretty much nothing in common, especially considering age (as in when) and genre difference, and even the vibe of the riff (in question) itself is so different. So yeah, taking into the account how Conquer All was done, it’s possible that Nergal unconsciously borrowed a motive for main verse riff, but saying anything like “Behemoth stole the song” is an extreme stretch to say the least) And it’s not like that riff is what makes the song so great – there are more than plenty of other reasons!

So yeah, best Behemoth song, imho, and personally for me – very close to my personal second favorite, Mysterium Coniunctionis (Hermanubis), from the same album.

Let us know what you think about this one! And what are your thoughts on that whole Anthrax business, if any?

Conquer All

Live 2009, from “Evangelia Heretika” (2010)

Pure Evil And Hate is a song from “And The Forests Dream Eternally” (1995) mini-album, and is easily one of the most famous Behemoth’s earliest period songs, I would even say it’s second most well-known after From The Pagan Vastlands. The first wave of fame came (partially) due to confusing language used by the band: on the back of the record they claimed Pure Evil And Hate to be a tribute to Bathory, implying it was inspired by Bathory… However, in metal word tribute is usually used as synonym to cover, so the band got bombarded by post mail, with people asking where did they find such Bathory song in a first place. The other reason is probably that it’s one of the most often early Behemoth songs that they play live. It wasn’t like with From The Pagan Vastlands, which was played non-stop; instead Pure Evil And Hate seems to be more of a random addition to setlists, even in (relatively) more modern days. Because of that, there is a number of live recording available. The song itself is unusually… almost rock’n’roll’y riff, even Bathory themselves didn’t play it like that. And, of course, it’s also much more thrashy than their usual delivery, which makes it the most stand out track of the EP stylistically. I would say the song title is even contradictory to the music: it’s not ‘pure evil’ or ‘hate’, it’s probably the most fun song they ever did. It’s a classic; you just have to know it, even if you don’t like their early stuff.

Pure Evil And Hate

XXX Years Ov Blasphemy, live

I’ll be taking a break for 2 days, but I’ll return on Sunday.

Post-God Nirvana and Malaria Vulgata are opening tracks of twelfth album “Opvs Contra Natvram” (2022). Malaria is a rather common and a very deadly disease, typically caused by certain insects, while Vulgata is “common” in latin, referring to 4^(th) century latin translation of the bible, thus together the song title is basically about calling the bible ‘common disease’.

Post-God Nirvana is a quite decent post-industrial intro track and, ironically, is even one minute longer than the song that follows. Malaria Vulgata just might be the most grindcore song Behemoth ever did, and not just because it’s short, but also because there is lot packed in those two minutes. While it might not be particularly catchy, I think it’s a good start for the album, specifically in a way that it offers what previous two albums where kinda lacking, especially “I Loved You At Your Darkest” (2018) – just locked-in, tight and determined, blastbeaty Behemoth, like in 2000s. Do you agree? Or not?

Post-God Nirvana

Malaria Vulgata