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Malleus Maleficarum > Nothing Left to Fight For > Reviews
Malleus Maleficarum - Nothing Left to Fight For

For the third time. - 96%

KayTeeBee, October 4th, 2007

Okay. Here's the deal. I haven't felt this way since 2005. I don't know what happened in 2005, but I was hearing some true black metal left and right, twenty four hours a day, eight days a week, 600 days a years. I think I heard 2 good black metal albums in 2006. Anyways, point is, Malleus Maleficarum's latest offering, "Nothing Left to Fight For", is the most awesome black metal album I've heard in the last year at least. And i'm talking about true black metal, none of that forest rubble, none of that melancholic stuff, none of that norwegian shit, i'm talking about true nihilistic black metal. Most people probably look at the album title as a reference to the modern world, how all societies have gone down the drain, etc. etc. It's actually a reference to being the best band in a genre where 19 bands out of 20 suck major donkey testicules. Although this isn't unexpected, after all this is the band who gave us the two most underrated black metal albums of the 21st century, "Taedium Vitae" and "Des Bibles, Des Hymnes, Des Icones...". It never ceases to amaze me how people think this band is average. "Oh, yeah, I know Malleus Maleficarum, they're OK...nothing great, though" Go back to your norwegian bullshit, asshole. This is true black art.

"Nothing Left to Fight For" is a clear evolution for the band. Their first album was a raw, simplistic and efficient respectable black metal debut. It ruled. Then, their sophomore effort was absolutely mindblowing, given the combination of 6 gatrillion beats per minutes riff-o-ramas, the slow, melancholic-yet-not-whiny-like-a-black-metal-schoolgirl moments, and the clean (not accoustic) moments of pure nihilism. However, on this album, the stuff is just pushed to the next level. The next level of black metal art. And let's be honest with each other, noone's really accessed the next level in black metal since 1994. Given the tone of this album, I've come to the conclusion that this is true nihilism in a sound form. I don't know who the biggest nihilist philosophers were, but if they were alive today, they would be in this band (or at least invade their website's guestbook with various forms of nihilistic admiration, seing as not all philosophers are musicians as well).

Musically, this is rifftacular. A good example of this is on the track "Malleus Maleficarum". It reminds me a lot of some of the stuff Bael did on their EP "Bleeding for Him". This album is 53 minutes of intense riffs. There's a few clean and accoustic moments here and there to give the listener a chance to take a break from all the awesome music. I'm gonna churn out some adjectives here: dissonnant, agressive, heavy, dark, nihilistic, etc... Just look at the song titles. There's no title like "under a funeral goon" or "hawaiian hunger". "Delivrance", "Les Vestiges de mon Amertume" (the vestiges of my bitterness), "les Traces", etc. Fuck forest shit, yeah? The only sign of mere douchehattery on this album is on "...La Perversion Comme Représentation". The song itself is great, clean guitar, cool ambient sounds, distorted vocals. The only thing is that it becomes an industrial song in the end. Hey, if I wanted some industrial, I would have picked up some Blut Aus Nord EP, you catch my drift?

Anyways, this is true. Very very true. They're from France, they don't have daydreams about making bonfires in forests, they don't give a damn about what you think. There is nothing left to fight for...so just listen to some nihilistic black metal. TRUE BLACK METAL FOR TRUE BLACK METAL FANS.