Various Artists
Visionaires Of The Macabre Vol.2 - An Evil Elite

December 2001
Released: 2001, Lost Disciple Records
Rating: 0.5/5
Reviewer: Luxi Lahtinen

RATING: Darkmoon 3.75/5, the rest 1/5





First off, here's a straight quote from the inner sleeve text of this CD, presumably both put together and written by Rich Fatalo of Lost Disciple Records:



"This compilation was not done out of following any trend or hype. It was created to expose to the world some of the dedicated misanthropes spawned by the US Black Metal scene and to silence the detractors of US Black Metal, be they critics or fans who feel the only true Black Metal comes from the European soil. Evil knows no boundaries..."



Evil knows no boundaries indeed - my "evil" certainly doesn't 'coz to release a comp. CD that either completely sucks content-wise or sound-wise, shouldn't make much sense at all. If the content of this CD speaks for great volumes of the future of US Black Metal, then they won't be having too flattering of a future ahead of them, I'm afraid - expect Darkmoon who actually was the only decent sounding and interesting bunch out of the whole pile of total 13 bands introduced here. The rest of the bands (Bloodshed Divine, Averse Sefira, Cryptic Winds, Kult ov Azazel - just to name a few!) unfortunately sounded like very demo-quality, almost rehearsal standard bands i.e. very untalented, un-inspiriting and simply boring to me and by no means either catchy or good at all. And by judging the words of Rich again, I only could say if "the true Black Metal" is meant to sound like the abovementioned ingredients I just listed you here, then that's just fine with me. I only care for a well-made, well-constructed and most of all, well-played music that's catchy, stick in your mind at first listen and makes you want it more and more - being it metal or not, "true" or "un-true", it simply doesn't matter one damn bit! Therefore, Darkmoon is the only exception out of this annoying compilation that deserves my sincere respect for proving that some great Black Metal can be done in the terms of hard work - having a strong need and motivation to challenge yourself both as a musician and as a band constantly and doing it for yourself only without caring whether you can be considered "truer-than-thou" amongst some pathetic circles of wanna-be morons.



Besides that, I was just wondering whether someone could kindly define for me the term "true Black Metal (I doubt it has ever existed in the first place...?!)" 'coz obviously I have somehow missed the whole point here. And please don't bring me that "bad sound-worse music-the worst image" - bullshit any more with your definitions about "the true Black Metal" 'coz a bad music is just a bad music - good is good. It's just as simple as that. Period.