An often forgotten side of the black metal scene is the one from Finland. Quite often with a very distinct sound that separates them from their Norwegian and Swedish neighbors, there are a whole bunch of high quality and interesting bands to be found. One of these has been around for over 20 years and is releasing their 8th album with Eight Coffin Nails. Alghazanth has been a bit of an undervalued and underestimated band with a very distinct personality. The name of the new album is actually pretty fitting, because with this 8th album they’re burying the band forever…

As soon as album opener Self-Exiled starts, you get blasted in the face with a bloodcurling scream from vocalist Thasmorg and typical melodic black metal riffage which flows into a calmer intermezzo that immediately makes me think of Moonsorrow. Which is a feeling that comes back regularly throughout the album and shouldn’t be too surprising since Henri Sorvali (main composer of Moonsorrow and Finntroll) added keyboards and by doing so clearly influenced the overall composition of the songs. He managed to add a very epic feeling to the music without going overboard. This is still purely black metal that simply shines and stands out even more by the beautiful melodies that backs the otherwise dark, harsh and cold music.

The whole album is littered with high quality black metal with many highlights. Listen to Facing The North with cold tremolo picking and perfectly balanced keyboard sounds in the background. Or Aureate Waters with a wall of sound of atmospheric mid-tempo structures blasting into raw higher paced parts. But a real standout track is definitely At Their Table, which is a perfect showcase of how to create a song with a traditional black metal sound that is heavily touched by symphonic hooks without making it sound tacky or overproduced. Henri‘s touch to this track (and the whole album) brings loads of atmosphere while not smothering the rest of the music but rather giving it an extra push to the spotlight.

The instrumental track Pohjoinen creates the perfect atmosphere and buildup towards the closer and actual “Swan song” of Alghazanth. To Flames the Flesh is a 9 minute epos built on a mid-tempo atmospheric that will captivate and carry you to a different world. The drums and guitars fall into perfect synch creating that trance-inducing wall of sound you can find in many modern black metal outfits, giving the vocals a central spot to give way to a sort of doom and gloom feeling. With regular more quiet intermezzos that brings the background composition more to the front they create an even more captivating atmosphere and that’s also how they end this song… in pure and beautiful simplicity it fades out, just like the band fades out with this last track.

Alghazanth proves with their very last release Eight Coffin Nails that you don’t have to add huge symphonics or massive choirs to make your music sound epic. The smartly and intricately crafted composition in each track makes the cold and raw black metal sound shine in all its glory, making it sound beautiful yet still evil as fuck. It’s a pity that a band who can deliver this kind of quality work brings its career to an end, but talk about going out while you’re at your peak!

Release date: April 30th, 2018
Label: Woodcut Records
Tracklist:
1. Self-Exiled
2. Facing the North
3. Aureate Waters
4. The Upright Road
5. At Their Table
6. The Foe of Many Masks
7. Twice Eleven
8. Pohjoinen
9. To Flames the Flesh