If it’s black metal you want, it’s black metal you’ll get, and Marduk have come out fighting with their latest offering, Frontschwein. Eleven delicious slabs of exactly what Marduk does best, this is an album that could well being one of the releases that people will be talking about all year long in 2015.
Quite simply, Frontschwein is pretty damn stunning. Marduk know how write an earworm or two, and an early highlight is The Blond Beast, with an introduction so catchy it’ll no-doubt be rattling round your head for days. It has a very traditional black metal feel to it that will get your foot tapping and head banging along to the beat, and that’s before you even take into consideration the repeating guitar line and fantastically delivered guttural vocals.
Another fantastic offering is Nebelwerfer. More of a slower-paced song, it still packs a real punch and shows another side to Marduk, especially with the vocals being bellowed rather than screamed at first, and it’s more of a doomy piece, which is certainly not a bad thing because it shows versatility and gives the album a breath of fresh air.
Whilst Marduk haven’t exactly reinvented the wheel with Frontschwein, since it doesn’t tread any drastically new ground but honestly, did it really need reinventing to begin with?
9/10
