Review by Saxy S for Behemoth - The Satanist (2014)

Album of the Decade? Not Quite

If you were to ask me what the most important albums of the decade were; the ones that we can look back on in another ten years from now and say "that's what the 2010s were all about!" I would assume most people would say Behemoth's The Satanist somewhere in their top ten. And I would have to agree. This album is pretty filthy blackened death metal that someone like me would come to appreciate. It doesn't sound sloppy or unfinished. The production is solid and Nergal's vocal delivery is some of the best it has been in Behemoth's entire discography.

However, Behemoth are a band that have been doing this shtick for a long time and it should come as no surprise to anyone. Ghost get a lot of flack for being a satantic worship cult even though their music is way too safe and mainstream. If normies are worried about cults, this is the group that they should be worried about! But where Behemoth falls short of Ghost is those grooves and hooks that are desperately lacking.Most people who listen to this won't need them and I can understand. But outside of some great riffage and technical proficiency, this album just lacks the core to keep me coming back.

This isn't a bad record. In fact, it's pretty damn excellent. I just wish that Behemoth could do something more with the genre, the subject matter and the songwriting than this. Behemoth created this album almost as a jumping on point into death metal and it serves its purpose surprisingly well. But I like my melodic metal, which does make me feel isolated from the rest of the crowd at times, but I'll stick with Omnium Gatherum, Insomnium, and Scar Symmetry.