Hecate - In Nomine Artem Blackium Review

Sometimes I wonder how would that be like to present someone who doesn’t know anything at all about Symphonic Black Metal. How would be the reaction? I guess the first reaction would be to cover the ears and say something like “Oh, my God!”. To listen to such an effort is surreal, if you ask me. It’s not an earthly experience. That I can guarantee.

Let’s take, for instance, the two tracks with female vocals guest appearance “Sons ov Hecate” and “Surrealistic Ressurection” where the general feeeling is of a sick, otherworldly and ghostly opera – well, to me all operas have this exact feeling. The operatic female voice gives the songs an ethereal and almost supernatural mood while the gutural male death growls add the demonic presence to accomplish the unearthly feeling. In both tracks the Black Metal instrumental is overwhelmed by the orchestration which gives an even more out of this world feeling due to the mesmerizing guitars. It’s interesting to notice how Hecate mix Death Metal and Black metal instrumental features in “In Nomine Artem Blackium.” The fan that are into both scenes will notice the difference. Last track and grand finale “Oceans Ov Hell” is the best example of this melt where the vocal duet shows both influences althought the instrumentals are purely Death Metal with the orchestrations. In this track Metal instrumentals overlap the orchestrations. Also I could feel a certain taste of the great Cirith Ungol in it. From Extreme Metal world the nearest influence seen maybe is Satyricon and their mesmerizing instrumentals.

I find it very difficult not to praise the decision of Hecate to record an album like this. First of all, “In Nomine Artem Blackium” is a double CD where CD1 shows a more Symphonic Black Metal influence and CD2 is purely its orchestral version. It’s a bold and brave decision to do that. This album is the real living proof that today’s Metal is completely influenced by Classical music and not by its ancestral influence that was the Blues. From where I’m standing I prefer CD1 with its majestic presentation of a Black Metal opera. The combination between the two genres sounds to be so natural that the fan may thing they were made to love each other forever. The grand opening with “Namaah” shows the fan everything Hecate have to show. Again, the most interesting thing here is to pay close attention on how the band goes combining Death and Black Metal influences and the orchestrations. Hecate bounce and equalize them very well throughout the album.

“In Nomine Artem Blackium” is the album for that fan that doesn’t like Classical music, but loves Extreme Metal, or, I guess the opposite is valid as well.

Hecate “In Nomine Artem Blackium” was released on August 06th 2020.

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