Agony Eternal is indeed all the statements above as members Dusk (guitars/bass), Galgenvot (vocals), and Anzillu (drums) have a firm grasp on the genre with a really nice delivery of freezing, very melodic black metal, without synths or heavy atmospherics, that will be a no-brainer for the likes of Istapp etc.

The riff-centric approach gets right to it with opener “Gravelust”, but it really grabs my attention for the second track, “Agony Eternal”, and rollicking third track “Towards Eternity”, where shrill tremolo-picked melodies are indeed at the forefront and spiral with nightsky fervor.

The first 2/3rds of “Where Cruelty Never Ends” slows the album’s initial onslaught down to a more somber mid-paced stomp and haughty gallop, as most black metal tends to here and thereBut it peaks with a traditional tremolo-picked fest.

“No Horizon” is a true mid-paced paced almost black and roll number before “Metamorphosis” increases the tempo a little to a more feverish, frosty romp. It’s all super catchy and memorable, which is sure to upset the more grim and true black metal crowd, especially considering the album’s far more menacing moniker.

Even more mid-paced, rocking melodic stuff appears at the start of “From Pride, To Shame, To Misery,” where some semi-baritone, clean vocals appear as well. But I prefer the album’s earlier frosty, blasting melodicism a little more. Luckily, penultimate track “Into the Lair” and final rip-roaring number “1644” (with more clean vocals) deliver it in spades, imbuing Old Man’s Child‘s debut a little to these ears.

A solid third album, though I’m not quite sure I’ll be grabbing the back catalog instantly as I have with other bands. But certainly a fine album, I’ll play here or there as the mood strikes me.

And while a ‘new’ band, Aphelium Aeternum has veteran members from a number of more obscure (at least to me) other German bands like Pestnebel, Drudensang, Ungod, and others as well as a newcomer, ‘M.P’ on the all-important keyboards. This veteran presence shows with a confident, classic-sounding debut that’s one of the more purely, classic sounding albums I’ve heard in a while, and certainly since Northwind Wolves‘ debut Cold Dark Grim back in 2018 and more recently Moonlight Sorcery‘s first EP.

The whole 90s symphonic black metal genre is perfectly encapsulated with both the writing and delivery, as well as the slightly tinny guitars, rasped vocals, and the wonderfully throwback, cosmic keyboards.

There’s the requisite atmospheric/instrumental intro “The Stargate Opens” (as well as mid-album and album-ending instrumentals) before the title track delivers a furiously raw, but majestic assault of riffs and keys that immediately shows the band’s grasp on the genre that contines for the next 40 minutes.

The pure throwback keys in “Spiritual Journey to the Arcane Cosmos” are gleefully archaic, but superbly done as they are in the next track “Voidgänger”. Instrumental “Event Horizon” is the album’s mid-point instrumental before “Where Creation Ends” and more epic “Into the Timeless Abyss” delivers two of the album’s most vicious tracks. And maybe that’s the one minor gripe- there isn’t a lot of pacing or change up in the material, the two tracks I just mentioned are pretty interchangeable with many of the others.

That said, the album’s back end is highlighted by the 8-minute standout ” Nocturnal Dimensions Unfold” and the short mid-paced number “Dead Eyes Stare into the Nightsky”, the album’s only ‘slow’ track’- that’s more of an outro, before the actual outro ends a fine album that has been on regular rotation for me since it came out.