Reviews list for Sargeist - Satanic Black Devotion (2003)

The crude melodies of Finnish bm are an oddly positive inclusion in a largely cold and pessimistic scene. I often think of them as sarcastically happy sounding. Like they are just bashing the shit out of their instruments yet somehow manage to adopt this primitive melodicism almost organically. Now, do not get me wrong, the bm is still undeniably frosty in temperature and the production values of Satanic Black Devotion dismiss any thoughts of this melodic edge being an accessible means to engage with the record still.

Sargeist’s debut album represents a solid foundation following an initial four years of demos and a split release. Formed in 1999 as Shatraug’s solo project, the set up soon grew into a band by the time of their third demo in 2001 and when they released their split with French bm crew, Merrimack just one year later, the familiar line-up of Hoath Torog, Horns and of course Shatraug was now cemented in place.

The rough-hewn melodies of the Finnish bm style are recognisable throughout the nine tracks that comprise the record. Noticeably folk in their nature on the track Sargeist, they ring around your head far more easily than you first realise until they are at infectious levels of presence in your consciousness. Likewise, the macabre chorus line of Black Fucking Murder won’t leave you alone for hours after listening to it either.

The album also makes great use of an intro as the chaotic and downright ugly sounding Preludium gives way to the charging and rampant title track and in so many ways this sums up the best of Sargeist’s debut release. The obtuse mixture they knead over the forty or so minutes that the album takes up manages to grow and fill all the available space around it whilst keeping you attentive to the very core of what is always happening. If I am to level any criticism is that because of the “devil-may-care” attitude to the album, some tracks get lost in the listing as they are far to similar to what has just gone before them. For instance, I have listened through the album an additional five or six times since revisiting for this review and I still cannot recall what Obire Pestis sounds like. It is the only track that lacks any real identity and one I suspect tat just got added to make up the numbers.

The mining tremolos of Panzergod, the pestilential melody of Sargeist and that death chant throughout Black Fucking Murder are what this album does best though, creating individual hovels of memorability on a consistent basis.