I was pretty excited to get Antestor's album Martyrium in the mail. Having heard that they play a form of black metal, and enjoying my recent exposure to that genre and its influences on metal bands, I really wanted to hear what Antestor had to offer.
The only release of this album is a pre-release cassette from Morphine Records. The full release on CD never came about, and quantities are very limited (possibly already gone). I have no idea what the future plans of the band are regarding any re-release of this material, but I did hear a rumor that they are working on their next album. There are no lyrics included with this cassette.
Antestor had three songs on the Rowe Productions compilation Northern Lights--"Mercy Lord", "Thoughts", and "Inmost Fear". The versions on Northern Lights may be the exact same recordings as the ones here; if not, they are very close.
As the first song on the tape started, I was a little bit disappointed. The music seemed overly subdued, with everything mixed too low. This was only my initial reaction, however. I have been listening to this tape a lot since then, and my opinion of it only gets better and better. Antestor plays a very artistic form of black-influenced metal. There is a lot of beauty and intensity, and a wide variety of speeds in these nine songs. The music has some doomy moments, but is mostly mid-paced to fast, while never quite reaching blistering speeds. There is one instrumental and one doomy "praise" song with lyrics seemingly taken from Psalm 51. Amid the standard metal instruments, they effectively make use of some keyboards and piano. Variety characterizes the vocals as well--along with screeched and rasped, almost whispered black metal style vocals, they incorporate some well-placed clean male vocals, beautiful female vocals, and even some lower death style growling.
"Thoughts" exemplifies their great song structure. It starts off with a very mellow, pretty flute-like keyboard melody. Added to this is a more menacing keyboard part that warns of the intensity to come. Slowly the double bass becomes audible, pounding away, and finally the guitars take over the melody formerly played by the flute-like keyboard. The main body of the song is a killer black metal piece with excellent moods, cool drumming, and some nicely layered black and death vocals. Near the end, the guitars go back to that melody as a female voice sings along, using her voice as an instrument. This fades away and the flute-like sound finishes the song. Very well done!
I highly recommend this tape to anyone who enjoys the extreme side of things, but is not afraid of beauty in the midst of intensity. I am very close to giving this a five out of five rating...
4.5 tocks
Other coverage for this album
Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by HadeSlayeRThis is the album that was supposedly released by Morphine Records, before they went into 'kick the band off the label' frenzy. Consisting of 9 songs, including 3 previously released songs on Northern Lights - "Inmost Fear", "Thoughts" and "Mercy Lord" alongside 6 other new songs, including my current favorite, a beautifully composed "Depressed" a slow and haunting song full of piano parts. On…Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by FetusBe prepared to pee your wittle pants! It's a shame to say this is the only full length, 9 track LP from ANTESTOR. Yes, the majority of this LP is Christian black metal, but there is plenty of Doom/Death mixed throughout. Unlike many black bands that use only high pitched vocals there are plenty of low deathy vocals here, with some songs focusing almost solely on death vox. Unfortunately this was…Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by ScumWhat is it about northern Europe? Is it something in the water? From Norway comes a band that goes by the name Antestor, and I have gotten my hands on a pre-release of their first full length album. For those of you who are familiar with the Norwegian metal sound you already know about the way bands from this region delicately blend harmonic guitars in with crushing death fury. The guitars on…Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by NecRoSarX...and this is why I got into metal in the first place. Martyrium is such a big steamy slab of METAL, dripping with death metal juices, smothered in a frigid black metal gravy. There is a reason why Antestor was named one of the most brutal black metal bands in Pit magazine, keeping in mind that Pit deals with some of the most brutal unholy secular death and black metal bands out there. That says…Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by sesspoolAHHHH! This is what black metal was wanting to be when it existed in someone's mind... so long ago. This is by far the best black metal album I've ever heard in my life. From the piercing calm of some material... to the thundering emotion of other areas... Very good clean vocals... fantastic music and song structure... I can listen to this album 4 times in a row and not be tired of it. Lyrically,…Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by WoodensoulOne of the greatest doom/black metal albums has finally arrived!! It has been a few years in the waiting, but Martyrium finally was released at this year's Cornerstone festival. As soon as the merchandise table for Antestor was set up I rushed in and bought this cd, because I knew after their performance everybody would want one. Now this album is very different from Return of the Black Death,…Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by undeadMetal fans beware! Along with Extol's Undeceived, Antestor has released the best album of the year. This is an amazing blend of doom and sadness. For those of you as taken with Return of the Black Death as I am, this album may come as a little shock. Antestor sounds like two different bands as their transisted between doom and black metal between albums. But this is such an amazing switch. Both…Dead Zine 2003Reviewed by SORGThis is a remarkable cd for many reasons. Although this is just now seeing the light of day on Endtime Productions (it was released illegally on cassette a couple years back) this second release from Antestor is actually their first release as it was recorded BEFORE their Cacophonous records debut Return of the Black Death, not only was it recorded before tRotBD it was recorded all the way back…HM Magazine #90Reviewed by Jamie Lee RakeTime for a history lesson, y'all. Before everyone's fave corpse-painted godly Swedish deathmetalurgists Antestor tore it up a couple years back with their Scandinavian-folk-melodies-incorporating Return of the Black Death, they recorded a set of more traditionally deathly fare. Only, back in '95 when they recorded it, they didn't call it mere death metal. No, to mourn the Satanism so rife in…Similar sounding releases
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