BLACK BEAST "Arctic Darkness" CD

BLACK BEAST return to survey the carnage with second album Arctic Darkness. A simple-yetelegant title, Arctic Darkness is the sound of BLACK BEAST maximizing that atmosphere. The Motorcharge is most definitely still there, as is the almost-sexual surge suggestive of classic Impaled Nazarene - grandfathers of both Finnish black metal AND bringing back the Motorhead influence into black metal at large - but with a subtly ubliminal glaze of synths and a wider variation of tempos and general songcraft, the now-quartet march into new realms across this Arctic Darkness (bassist Xilobye joined the band prior to the album); just witness the utterly EPIC ten-minute closer, "Hymn of the Freezing Wind," where clean 'n' chorused guitars play counterpoint to a sleazy four-on-the-floor beat...truly, this landscape is a much more brazen one.