Enkil - Demo 1995

Enkil - Demo 1995
1) Annointed in Blood
2) ...And the Blood God Awaits...
3) Palace of the Vampire
4) Mine King and Queen are Dead
5) Akasha

Reuploaded

Some USBM this time, here is the only demo (and release, as far as I know) from Enkil which was a two-man project featuring Magnus Thorne and Mikai Tepesh, latter known to some from Anwyl and Nephilim. There were two pressings of this demo and my copy was of the first press which featured xeroxed covers and regular tapes. The second pressing had professional, glossy covers. Scans included. Like the song titles probably tell you, this, like about half of the USBM bands of the 90's seemed to be, is vampiric black metal. Vampires were a popular theme in the 90's everywhere, I guess the 1992 version of Dracula and the Anne Rice books were large part of the reason. The USBM interest in vampires might owe more to Michael Ford's aka Baron von Abaddon's influence. But that's enough about that.

What we got here is pretty raw black metal, in the quite typical 90's USBM sound. The tape was a little worn in places which leads to inevitable flaws, but fortunately nothing severe. I failed to mention that the US take on vampiric black metal tends to be less romantic and goth-fluffy than say CoF's version, if you've listened to Black Funeral you probably know this. So it's quite cold and cruel sounding, not as esoteric and sinister as Ford's stuff but not sparkly Twilighty shit either. I meant the girls' series, not the "all-star" band there. I'm not 100% sure what to make of this one-off, it's not bad and has much of that cool, easily recognizable 90's Stateside sound to it, yet on the other hand it leaves me wanting something more. The almost constant breakneck speed combined with the thin, razorsharp guitars makes me wish they'd slow down every now and then. Oh well, I've listened to worse. Grab this if you're into underground black metal, USBM or vampires.