Pure Holocaust is
where Immortal really got started. Solid in their version of Norwegian Black
Metal and ready to pursue it, Abbath and Daemonez here took full control of
their direction and charged forward with confidence and resolve, crafting what
is an absolutely criminally underrated album, a crime which besmirches the
entire genre. The result is one of the best offerings of the Norwegian scene, a
Black Metal classic, and still one of Immortals’ top three records.
A short, 8 song, 34 minute affair, Pure Holocaust opens with “Unsilent Storms in the Northern Abyss,”
a song that if nothing else showcases Immortals’ new, more focused musical
direction and commitment to ridiculous titles. The one real musical difference
between this and Diabolical FullmoonMysticism is the presence of sustained double bass drumming and blast
beats. Had Diabolical contained this
more frantic percussion work, it would have been a more traditional Norwegian
style Black metal album, more on the level with Emperor’s self-titled and Wrath of the Tyrant. Other songs such as
“The Sun No Longer Rises” and “As the Eternity Opens” enter the Immortal canon
of great works. Only a year later than Diabolical
Fullmoon Mysticism, the advances made here are really impressive.
The liner notes list a drummer named Grim, but apparently
Grim never actually played on this recording. Instead, the drums were handled
by Abbath, establishing another Immortal hallmark, that of being a two man band
for the major part of its existence. Abbath and Daemonez were Immortal, at least during these early years, with Abbath
recording most of the music and Daemonez writing most of the lyrics, while each
would dip in to the others’ realm on occasion. Daemonez would continue to write
Immortal lyrics after he was forced to sit out of the real band work due to
physical issues, and Abbath would spend the next three albums essentially
working with one other partner: Daemonez for the next two records, and then
drummer Horgh for the last two, with Blizzard
Beasts being the one where Daemonez and Horgh would cross paths.
Pure Holocaust
also is the album that takes steps to solidify the Immortal musical blueprint, enshrining
things like the general riff style and the slower, more atmospheric interludes
pioneered on Diabolical Fullmoon
Mysticism as hallmarks of the band, the elements that, along with Abbath’s
characteristic Black Metal croak, would make music instantly recognizable as
coming from Immortal. Later albums in the bands’ career, namely Damned in Black and Sons of Northern Darkness, can trace a straight and unbroken line
back to Pure Holocaust more than any
other entry in the discography to establish their parentage.
Here’s a bit of really unfounded and probably totally wrong
supposition, but it is my opinion that Pure
Holocaust is one of the most seminal records of Norwegian Black Metal, as
it would be followed by seemingly endless imitators who never were able to
match the original, but were none the worse for trying. So much of the Finnish
Black Metal scene, particularly a band like Horna, sounds like at some point in
their development they had this record on repeat, as so many of us did when
first we heard it. Bands like Mayhem and Burzum and Darkthrone get all the
attention and acclaim, and most of the credit for inspiring the next wave and
waves to come of Black Metal bands, but I have always thought that there was
more than a little bit of Pure Holocaust
DNA in practically every Scandinavian Black Metal band post-1993, whether they
knew it or not, whether it was intentional or not.
On Pure Holocaust,
Immortal utilizes one of Black Metals’ most suffocating and oppressive
features: the wall of guitar sound, that total hammering quality of that one
instrument that doesn’t necessarily make the other instruments stand out or
work better, but fills the entire listening space with itself until it becomes
a rhythmic white noise that you can literally feel pushing down on you as you
listen. The DSBM bands would later come along and do this is incredible
precision, but this is the album not by Burzum that isn’t De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas that employs this, and it is crushing.
Compared to its predecessor, which had a very thin and tinny guitar sound, Pure Holocaust sounds like a room full
of angry bees, buzzing away fast and aggressively. In this, Pure Holocaust fits in alongside titanic
releases from Darkthrone of the same time period, and Emperor’s majestic In the Nightside Eclipse, which would
come out in the following year, 1994.
Pure Holocaust never
gets tired, it never gets dull. If this is the kind of thing you like to hear
in your Black Metal, this record is a total pillar supporting the temple, and
proved that the band had arrived on the scene. While contemporaries like
Emperor and Enslaved would get more ambitious quickly, resulting in a rapid
acquisition of attention from the scene and the press, and Burzum, Mayhem, and
Darkthrone would continue as legacy names, retaining a lot of attention from
the same, Immortal would be something of an afterthought, and that is tragic. But
this record should be on every Metalheads’ playlist, and on every Best Of list.
It would take Immortal two, or maybe three, records to even approach this one
in terms of overall quality, and is an absolute lock for second or, at absolute
worst, third place in any serious ranking of the bands’ total output.
Essential.
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