Track Listing

1. All Shall Fall
2. The Rise of Darkness
3. Hordes to War
4. Norden on Fire
5. Arctic Swarm
6. Mount North
7. Unearthly Kingdom

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7744 in Music
• Released on: 2009-10-06
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .22 pounds

Album Description
2009 album from the Norwegian Black Metal heads, one of the most important bands of the genre. For nearly two decades, Immortal have been creating unique, skull-scraping Black Metal, always remaining one step ahead of everyone else. The band has finally found a stable line up with Abbath on guitars/vocals, Horgh on drums, Apollyon on bass and Demonaz still doing the lyrics.

Customer Reviews

90/100, Immortal treats us to a grim and frostbitten peek of Blashyrkh.
This album is epic, and actually makes the seemingly endless wait worth it. Abbath's vocals and guitar playing are equally excellent. Horgh's drumming is both creative and super precise. The new bassist isn't all that noticeable because he's barely even audible. Demonaz is becoming a better lyricist and it shows.

"All Shall Fall"-Starts off with some ambient noise, but that doesn't last long. Soon you're thrown into an amazing riff that gets quickly followed by another equally amazing riff. The drumming is fantastic on this song, precise and brutal. Abbath's vocals jump in with a quick bark and then come in full fledged. An amazing song and an overall excellent choice as the title track and opener. 9.5/10

"The Rise Of Darkness"-Immortal follows up "All Shall Fall" with another great, albeit softer and slower song. It hints at heaviness early on but doesn't really reach it until about halfway through. There's some really cool drumming on this song and I really like the chorus, but it's just not quite as awesome as the title track. 8.5/10

"Hordes To War"-This song comes out screaming. It's incredibly fast, extremely brutal, very chaotic and just overall very intense. 9/10

"Norden On Fire"-Starts off with the noise of howling wind and some soft guitar playing to set the mood. Then the heavy riffing drops in like a bomb. The song starts out great, and only gets better. The last bit of the song gets really epic with some excellent riffing. 9/10

"Arctic Swarm"-Starts out simple but brutal, and gets more technical and progressive as it goes on. Almost sounds like a death metal song. The song changes in the end and sounds much more like black metal, and Abbath has a cool albeit short solo near the end as well. 8.5/10

"Mount North"-Another very epic sounding song, filled with absolutely great riffs and stellar drumming. It gets heavier and heavier as it goes on, and Abbath's solo is awesome. 9/10

"Unearthly Kingdom"-Starts off with very dark sounding ambient music that really sets the mood, it totally gets you into the song. Then the riffing comes in, mid-paced and trance-like and extremely catchy. Then things heat up and the song gets insanely epic. A battle horn sounds and then the song grows soft while the gates of Blashrykh open. Then drums come in as epic as possible with equally awesome guitar to bring the song through it's final stretch until it's end. The first time I listened to this song I knew it was great, but every time you listen to it, it gets even better. Truly excellent track, it made me sad to hear it fade out. 10/10

My favorite songs are "All Shall Fall", "Hordes To War", and "Unearthly Kingdom". While some bands try as hard as they can to be as "true" or "necro" as possible and others throw in cheesy amounts of keyboards and synthesizers to try and make their music sound more epic or accessible, Immortal is truly evolving black metal in ways no other band has even thought of. This is quite possibly Immortal's best album to date.

The Classic "Immortal" Sound
This album continues with that highly distinctive Immortal sound in the vein of juggernauts such as "At the Heart of Winter" and "Sons of Northern Darkness," and is every bit as good as those two entries in the band's ouevre. Immortal is probably the only black metal band that I can think of that write songs that are actually "catchy" in a weird way. These tracks sort of get into your head and keep re-playing there long after you've put the headphones away.

At first, when I heard the album, it failed to grab me in the way that "Sons" did on the very first listen. Now that I've played it a few times, though, I'm completely hooked. Great songs, great production values (actually a little better than "Winter" or "Sons," it seems), great atmosphere, and killer album art (I especially love the blackened wintry landscape presided over by a bleach-bone moon in the gatefold). "All Shall Fall" is a premium black metal listening experience. Recommended by this listener without reservations.

The masters are back!
This is an awesome album and what black metal/Immortal is all about. Thundering riffs, lightning fast pounding drums and great lyrics/vox. Immortal always makes great music and the lyrics always make you feel like your up top of that vast mountain or glacier or in the war with them. Very great atmosphere. Awesome band, great comeback album! Can't wait to see these guys live!