It’s Sunday morning here at the NCS compound, and that must mean it’s time for another installment of The Rearview Mirror, in which we take a rare backward look at the metal of yesteryear. It’s also time for me to feed the loris horde before they start sharpening their knives again. But I think I’ve got enough time to put up these tunes before they launch an assault; they’re very deliberative.

Today I decided to include music from two bands, Axamenta from Belgium and Ragnarok from Norway. It’s quite a contrast.

AXAMENTA

Over a span of roughly 10 years, Axamenta put out a handful of demos and EPs and two albums, the last of which was 2006’s Ever-Arch-I-Tech-Ture — and then split up before releasing anything else. Metal-Archives classifies them as “melodic death/black metal”, but there’s certainly a symphonic component to their sound as well. In fact, there are times on Ever-Arch-I-Tech-Ture when they really go over the top with the keyboards. But the album also includes some powerful, memorable, and at times unconventional melodic death metal, with potent riffs and majestic melodies draped in a shroud of thorns. Continue reading »