Hellveto - Zmierzch

2005 was a very busy year for Poland's current best symphonic pagan black metal band Hellveto. Releasing two full lengths (Klatwa and Prelude to Dying) and several re-issues of earlier work. Those being Zemsta and Shadows of the Blue & My Eternal Hegemony... Already he's started off on this year, releasing Stos, a collection of recordings from 2004/2005 and now his newest recorded full length Zmierzch which translates as dusk in Polish.

This album finds Hellveto moving forward from Klatwa's more solid base then the floating strange feeling of Prelude to Dying. But there is still the dark feeling, along with epic keyboards which highlight and play counterpoint to the guitars. The drums sound very good, there are a lot of cases of very peculiar drum beats, but all of this is quite good. In fact I would say the sole member of Hellveto, one L.O.N. is one of the greatest gifts to the current black metal scene. Much like America's Xasthur, Hellveto is creating music that seems to act both within you and without you, creating soundscapes to become lost into, bringing something else into your soul. Whilst Xasthur focuses on darker more brooding subjects, Hellveto is commited to his past, and his music reflects this strong medieval feeling, really this is one of the few bands that truly takes you to another age, to another feeling. It is this powerful quality that has led me to buy nearly every Hellveto album easily attainable. Each album seems like a variation on a sound distinctly his own. No band sounds exactly like this, though there are prescedents, for example fellow Poles, Graveland and Veles, and also Austria's Summoning, and Satyricon's Dark Medieval Times album. But those are very vague, and really give only a slight hint at what Hellveto actually sounds like.

This is certainly one of his best, though then again every one of his albums is brilliant in its own way. Perhaps not as organic and raw as In Arms of Kurpian Phantom, nor as dark and creepy as Klatwa, this album reminds me most of Medieval Scream and Zemsta, with similar elements to the first two. The feeling is more epic, the atmosphere less dark, but the music remains as powerful as always. True pagan black metal, essential for any fan of epic symphonic black metal.