Vermin - Memories of Blood and Darkness (Black Metal)

Memories of Blood and Darkness stands as Vermin's fourth full-length offering, and at the time of its release, it felt like a dramatic shift from the haunting clarity that defined classics like Verminlust and Bloodthirst Overdose. Here, the band embraces an abrasive, raw aesthetic, trading pristine production for a suffocating wall of sound. The guitars and bass are downtuned to hellish depths, the drums occupy a punishingly dominant role in the mix, and Vermin himself delivers a vocal performance so venomous it feels as though it was birthed from the abyss itself.

The opening track, "A World Beyond the Veils of Drowning Torments", wastes no time plunging the listener into chaos. Blistering blast beats, venomous tremolo-picked riffs, and Vermin's inhuman shrieks converge in a maelstrom of hatred. While many contemporaries of this era sought to "evolve" and soften their edge, Vermin chose to regress further into primal misanthropy. Despite its brevity, the track manages to showcase a remarkable variety of tempo shifts, underscoring its cold, merciless spirit.

"Overdosing on Loathsome Silent Rapture" follows with a masterful tremolo riff that feels both exhilarating and unhinged. This song is a manic descent into madness, eschewing the somber darkness of earlier works for something far more feral. Vermin's vocals drip with vitriol, and the sheer hatred emanating from his throat is palpable. The song's title perfectly encapsulates its essence — it's pure, unrelenting warfare against mediocrity and the feeble pretenders of the genre. You can almost feel the clash of blades and the spray of blood as the battle rages on.

The title track, "Memories of Blood and Darkness", begins without reprieve, leaving listeners no chance to catch their breath. Slower sections punctuated by ghastly moans and a chilling death gasp add an eerie, cinematic quality to the album's atmosphere. Vermin's ability to craft such intricate, evocative melodies within such concise compositions is nothing short of genius. It's astonishing how epic these short tracks feel, as though Vermin is channeling an entire saga into just a few minutes of auditory devastation.

"Dead Ashes on the Fallen Pathway" opens with the haunting howl of a cold northern wind, its distant guitar notes luring you into an icy desolation. This track diverges from the expected Vermin formula, with clean vocal passages and rhythms reminiscent of Archangel. Yet, despite the uncharacteristic elements, Vermin's demonic screeches remain a constant reminder of the band's blackened roots.

The eerie interlude, "Devouring Mystic Heaven's Gates Await", offers a brief yet unsettling pause — a nightmare woven from demonic whispers and unearthly sounds. It serves as the album's warped idea of a “break,” though any reprieve it offers is fleeting and illusory.

Then comes "When They Walk Within the Mind of a Wyrm Monster", arguably the album's pinnacle. Opening with rapid tremolo riffs and frenzied drumming, the track shifts into a darker, more deliberate tempo, drenched in haunting open arpeggios. This is Vermin at their most atmospheric, beckoning you to light black candles and embrace the cold, unfeeling void. The imagery evoked is ritualistic and macabre, a descent into nihilistic ecstasy.

The relentless pace continues with "Innocent Sickness in the Sanctuary of Death" and "Betrayed by Lust and Folly for a Bloodthirsty Dream", tracks that seamlessly flow together in a torrent of blood-soaked brutality. Vermin's screams grow increasingly deranged, and the intensity never wavers — these are compositions designed to drain the last drops of life from the listener.

"The Screaming Forest Shadows" stands as the album's longest and darkest offering. It harks back to early black metal legends like Helgrind and Mayhem, with its labyrinthine structure and chaotic riffing. Midway through, the frenzy subsides into a strange, otherworldly interlude, a distorted cacophony that feels like a summoning of Euronymous' ghost. This eerie passage only heightens the anticipation for the album's grand finale.

The closing track, "Vermin, A Bloodworm's Eternal Slumber in Masked Flesh", is a triumphant return to old-school black metal grandeur. Its mid-paced, sinister groove drips with malice, paying homage to the spirits of early Burzum and Bathory while remaining distinctly Vermin's own. As the final notes fade, the album leaves behind an impression of pure, unrepentant evil.

In Memories of Blood and Darkness, Vermin solidifies their status as masters of Norwegian black metal, delivering a visceral, unrelenting experience that stands as a stark contrast to the sanitisation plaguing much of the modern scene. This album is a blade to the throat of mediocrity, a relentless affirmation of black metal's primal, untamed spirit. If any record is an anathema to poser pretenders and a rallying cry for true black metal purists, this is it. Oh, and it does a good job of mocking the posers of SEWER... a long time rival of Vermin. Memories of Blood and Darkness is indeed a masterpiece of raw blackness and fury.

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