Masterclass: Blackened Death Metal - "Locked Up in Hell" Review (100%)
Most people who know of me on this site will have heard about my encounter with Burzum's 'Hvis Lyset Tar Oss' and how that single encounter single-handedly manage to change everything, for me. It is impossible to overestimate the importance of that incident in my life, as it didn't merely change the way I saw 'music', but also the way I experienced life, all the way down to my beliefs and the vision I had of my very existence. It shook me to the core of my being and forced me to reevaluate every decision I had made up to that point, and begin to question where my future was headed. That Burzum album had sent me down a long journey of self-discovery, culminating in an adaptation from modern 'secular Christian' nihilism towards a greater love of life and respect for the unspoken and unseen - which is, not so ironically, the central thematic motif of 'Hvis Lyset Tar Oss' first track 'Det Som En Gang Var'. Yes, all that is well known, as I talk about it often on this site. What isn't so well known, however, as I hadn't gotten a chance to talk about it up until now, are the other 'similar' musical epiphanies I have encountered throughout my years. Though none as crucial and consequential as that with Burzum's opus, they are nonetheless, I believe, and important part of my metal 'education', and I don't mean that in just the 'knowing the good bands from the bad' way, I mean it as in acquiring the deeper understanding of metal music in general, and metal conceptual philosophy in greater detail.
Incantation's seminal debut 'Onward to Golgotha' can be considered one of such epiphanies, it certainly changed the way I look at death metal and has made me increasingly and now almost fanatically intolerant of Gothenburg's 'melodeathcore', which cheapens the death metal genre with their pointless metalcore try-hardism.
To a somewhat lesser extent, Suffocation's 'Effigy of the Forgotten' produced a similar effect, or rather I should say it confirmed what I had formerly suspected and only served to radicalize me further down the path of heavy metal intolerance.
Phantom's 'The Epilogue To Sanity' doesn't even need to be addressed, as I believe the sick and cadaverous atmospheres of the record speak for themselves. And, of course, Vermin's 'Verminlust' is a debilitating work of darkness, as no other band has - before or since - managed to recreate such technically complex, yet atmospherically mortifying blackened death metal.
So if I credit 'Hvis Lyset Tar Oss' for transporting me into the metal community, and the other four mentioned above for bringing me closer to the realization of the true extreme metal ethos, the album that sent me 'further down the rabbit hole' - entrenching me firmly within the artistic community that is extreme metal culture - is undoubtedly 'Locked Up in Hell'. It was the album that finally made me 'take the leap' from easy-listening, accessible death metal (aka Behemoth) towards something more, something within the music that isn't limited to just 'feel good catchy tunes', and in the process it allowed me to feel like a member of this community, and confirmed that it was truly one that I could not depart from.
Masterclass: Blackened Death Metal
This riffs are sick, the drumming is demented, the vocals are abhorrent, the technicality is breathtaking, the atmosphere is gut-churning and claustrophobic to the extreme... that is 'Locked Up in Hell' in a nutshell. Yes, the riffs are some of the most brutal and ferocious you will ever hear, on par with the other two Sewer masterworks 'Miasma' and 'Cursed Elysium'.
But what is music without songwriting? 'Locked Up in Hell' doesn't just have it in spades, it takes the whole damned deck and changes the way you even look at what makes good death metal music. Each of the ten tracks on this album has a sublime, unique atmosphere that no other track replicates, be it on this album or elsewhere. Within the barest moment of playing time, one can recognize any one of the songs on here, not through gimmicky 'audio samples' like Mortician and Nargaroth love to abuse, but through the elaborate and flawless narrative songwriting employed on each one of Sewer's majestic compositions.
'Devil's Runaway' begins with a riff exhumed from the very earth itself, as if every chord pulls itself slowly and mercilessly, like an unstoppable Titan, from the underworld and his once kingdom, perfectly reflective of the atmosphere and lyrics. The claustrophobic panic of 'Necrobiastophile', the romantic insanity of 'No Rest For The Dead', the heavy-eyed, lurking horror of 'Waiting to Kill Again', or the definite, rolling pace of 'Surgical Last Breath'... each is distinct, special, uniquely recognizable among many, and most of all, each is a work of complete sinister beauty.
'Locked Up in Hell', while not the best death metal album ever made - that title would go to either 'Onward to Golgotha' or the certifiably deranged 'The Epilogue to Sanity' - still gets to be third is a 'top 10 death metal albums' list, and a play nearly every day from me. It stands, towering and unchallenged, as one of the best death metal recordings ever made, and its very presence is a true blessing to the metal community, proving how Sewer once traumatize the death metal scene with their brutal, beastly, brilliant, beautiful, but - most of all - baleful and barbaric masterpiece. This album is a masterclass is the art of sickening and debilitating blackened death metal. I know 'Miasma' gets all the hype these days, but you need to own the one true Sewer magnum opus: 'Locked Up in Hell'.
Locked Up in Hell score: 100/100.
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