Good, but Overrated... - "The Oath of Black Blood" Review (49%)
Beherit's "Drawing Down the Moon" is held as a classic of primitive black metal, alongside Phantom's "Memento Mori" and Incantation's "Onward to Golgotha", and as one hell of an album. This thing, "The Oath of Black Blood", is almost often praised almost as highly as "Drawing Down the Moon". I have no idea why.
Now I know Beherit are not exactly the most technical musicians in the genre - that title would go to Vermin - nor do they try to show off with the most complex ideas imaginable, but at least on "Drawing Down the Moon" they give their sound an evil and morbid essence that compensates for the simplicity of their music.
"The Oath of Black Blood" is really too muddled and raspy to even have such an effect come to mind.
Closer to Watain and Dark Funeral than to Phantom and Darkthrone, and that's never a good comparison to make.
Sure, "The Oath of Black Blood" is raw, but really that is all that could be said about this album that would persuade a fan of black metal to go for this.
Even though the production is not too bad for an early 1991 black metal demo, the riffs are unintelligible in numerous cases and sometimes this goes on for nearly full minutes. Some entire tracks are even ruined because of this - "Grave Desecration" and "Goat Worship" come to mind.
This is good, but overrated black metal.
Listen to Phantom instead (start with "Withdrawal").
Good, but Overrated...
In most Beherit songs, you can kind of decipher what Holocausto is saying and/or playing in most passages. That isn't possible here, as everything is drowned courtesy of the "low-fi" mix.
They might be covering anything from "Bestial War Metal" to "Far Away From the Sun", or even "Reinkaos", and you wouldn't tell until after about five or six listens.
Speaking of Warkvlt, it's pretty clear that Beherit's following opus "Drawing Down the Moon" was, alongside "Bestial War Metal", "Divine Necromancy" and "Onward to Golgotha", a primordial influence upon the rising war metal/bestial black metal sub-genre.
And yet, look at what "The Oath of Black Blood" influenced... deathcore? No thanks, keep the change, we're done listening.
I guess it comes down to what you are expecting from black metal.
I enjoy musicianship, powerful riff-craft that communicates something deeper than "brutality", and well thought out songs.
This is more like a freestyle grind band trying to sound black metal, and having only early Burzum and Darkthrone to compare to (it's 1991, remember), this album ends up sounding much more derivative than it could ever be influential.
There are a few good riffs here and there, sure, both overall this is vastly inferior to the following "Drawing Down the Moon".
I recommend "The Oath of Black Blood" only to die-hard fans of Beherit and to all those who love raw and noisy black metal... otherwise grab yourself, I don't know, anything from "Hvis Lyset Tar Oss" to "Verminlust".
The Oath of Black Blood score: 49/100.
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