Whilst extreme and black metal bands often come with additional baggage in the form of controversy, Stockholm’s Dark Funeral are often overlooked since they’ve managed to avoid being weighed down with too much drama thus far. Sure there’s been the odd royalties based court case, countless line-up changes and a small feature in an adult film but other than that, Dark Funeral have always put the music first.
Following on from their 2016 release Where Shadows Forever Reign, Dark Funeral have come back stronger and more ferocious than ever on this year’s release, We Are The Apokalypse. Whilst the line-up remains almost unchanged since their last album, the addition of drummer Jalomaah brings a whole new dynamic to the band, one that may yet prove to be a defining moment in their catalogue.
Right from the get go We Are The Apokalypse is an audio assault, its relentless, punishing black metal, brimming with all the usual traits. Corpse Paint? Check. Spikes? Check. Tremolos, blast beats and satanic imagery? Check, check and check. Rest assured though that this is no mere black metal by numbers parody, this is an album that breaks away from all expectations, exploring new ideas and compositions. Whilst opener ‘Nightfall’ may well begin where the last album left off, front man Heljarmadr’s howls in the chorus make for something much more memorable that will inevitably go down a storm in a live setting.
Whilst much of the album follows suit with its full speed sonic attacks, several songs set themselves apart, giving the album room to breathe. Tracks such as ‘Let The Devil In’ with it’s almost Dimmu Borgir level of pomp or ‘A Beast To Praise’ are still brutal, but also incorporate a lot of interesting melodies, making them so much more than just endless blast beats over white noise. The latter also makes way for the band’s newest member, drummer Jalomaah, to really shine with thunderous fills and solos proving he’s a more than worthy addition. ‘When I’m Gone’ and latest single ‘Leviathan’ also break the mould with their inclusion of clean guitars, a first for Dark Funeral despite the fact that a majority of their riffs are written acoustically, as founding member and guitarist Lord Ahriman explains: “I need to hear the tones as they are in order to find the harmonies that I had in my head. It’s only after doing this that I can transform these harmonies into my own Satanic symphonies.”
Perhaps the other most notable performance on the record is of course Heljarmadr’s vocals. Executed with crystal clear diction and clarity whilst also managing to effortlessly switch between a sort of pained, gruff, almost cleanly sung line straight into his blood-curdling howls. “A lot of death/black metal, it’s kind of stiff and straightforward – I find that boring. I feel like the vocals need to follow the melodies and on this record, I think Heljarmadr fucking nailed it.” Claims Ahriman. Showcasing these best is ‘Nosferatu’ a track that explores the use of these “sung” lyrics as well as spoken words and whispering, all of which collectively create a suitably creepy atmosphere for a song with such a title as well as one that claims to have been written during last summer’s lunar event, the blood moon.
Though Dark Funeral’s lengthy career may well have been plagued with line-up changes and minor set-backs, it finally feels as though they have arrived in their strongest form to date with We Are The Apokalypse. A solid album from start to finish, it delivers on all fronts, catchy hooks and memorable melodies, blisteringly heavy onslaughts and of course as all good black metal should be, it’s bleak, atmospheric and oozing with grimness at every turn.