Slavia - Strength and Vision

After eight demos and two EP's, Bergen, Norge's Slavia finally issues its first full-length. It's unclear whether Slavia is a one-man project with live session musicians, or a full-blown band. What's certain is that Jonas Raskolnikov Christiansen is on vocals (Raskolnikov is an awfully heavy name to lay on a child), backed by members of Glorior Belli, Deathcon, and Taake, including the infamous Hoest on bass. It's taken 10 years to summon up Strength and Vision (Drakkar, 2007), but the wait is well worth it.

Pissdrained Castles of Gold
Divided by Three

You know how at Slayer shows, girls will stick their tongues out, throw the goat, and yell "Fucking Slayer!" with a crazed, "I am small but violent" look in their eye? This record should elicit similar reactions. No depressive drones, no atmospheric bullshit, just fire-breathing, take-no-prisoners black metal. This stuff rocks.

Part of this record's appeal is its randomness. Sure, it dishes out godlike riffs, epic melodies, and scrubbing pad vocals like it ain't a thang. But not only does it end with a beautiful acoustic instrumental, it also goes buckwild with sampling. Either that, or the band has a full symphony at its disposal, which I highly doubt. It takes balls to sample this much - the opening orchestral fanfare lasts 1:18; "Divided by Three" begins with 1:11 of Chopin's Funeral March, and ends with traditional ethnic music (Middle Eastern? South Asian?) that's completely apropros of nothing. WTF?!

With the logo's iron crosses and the patriotic march that ends "Pissdrained Castles of Gold," I feared the worst. But when I asked the band if it was NSBM, the reply was, "Not at all." No lyrics came with the promo, but judging from the song titles, Slavia is about good old-fashioned blasphemy. This is easily one of the best black metal records of the year - don't sleep.

Strength and Vision is available in Europe at Drakkar, and in the US at Hells Headbangers. A live set with the album's songs is downloadable for free here.