Serpent Noir - Death Clan OD (2020)^{Release ID: 16819}

This is the Greeks' third full-length and their first in five years. This time around the lyrics are provided by Swedish occultist and author Thomas Karlsson, who formerly provided lyrics for Swedish symphonic death metal outfit Therion. Karlsson also performs the spoken vocals of closing track, GOEH RA REAH: Garm Unchained and his lyrics, as you would guess, are heavily involved with occult subject matter.

Serpent Noir's music is mostly mid-tempo black metal, although they do employ a few tempo changes during songs and can let rip with a good blast when the need takes them. I wouldn't exactly class them as melodic black metal, although they certainly do have some decent melodies, dissonance not really being part of their arsenal here, with a few nods to classic heavy metal in the vein of later Darkthrone. The production is very good, everyone gets the chance to be heard and the songs are well-written and involving. It's great to hear black metal bands that take time to hone their material before releasing a new album rather than churning out releases at an ever-increasing rate with no thought to quality control.