LIVE(STREAM) REVIEW: Emperor @ A Night of Emperial Wrath 2021
Despite not having recorded any original material for some twenty years, EMPEROR have managed to maintain their presence in the world of extreme metal with sporadic live incarnations. They have become one of those bands who have spent more time living their legacy as they did creating it but, in EMPEROR’s case, that’s not necessarily a criticism. The ‘emperial’ flame may have burned briefly, but it certainly burned bright.
In a period of little over seven years they became the de facto reference point for what would become known as symphonic black metal; established with the pair of incontestable classics In The Nightside Eclipse and Anthems To The Welkin At Dusk. It’s no exaggeration to say that some bands (DIMMU BORGIR, we’re looking at you) have built their whole career by building on this foundation.
The church of latter day EMPEROR, meanwhile, has always been a smaller sect, but no less devout. In many ways we’re only just catching up to the impenetrable complexity of IX Equilibrium and the enormous scale of Prometheus: The Discipline of Fire and Revenge, with bands like IMPERIAL TRIUMPHANT and PORTAL proudly taking up the mantle. EMPEROR studied black metal’s primitive musical principles before elevating them to ambitious new heights; that is their legacy. So there is, in other words, always an occasion to celebrate a band like EMPEROR and, as their festival dates keep getting pushed back to next year, they have descended upon our screens rather than the stage.
This may be EMPEROR’s first livestream event, but some of you will recall that Ihsahn performed his expansive solo material upon the very same stage a little over a month ago. The dimly lit cabaret setting which was installed inside the Notodden Theater has been overturned for a more conventional setup, and there’s a sense that something reassuringly metal is about to happen. Red lights? Check. Classic album backdrop? Check. Band in their black uniforms? Check. It’s been well over a year since anyone saw EMPEROR performing and, with the band promising a setlist featuring tracks from the entire catalogue, living rooms and bedrooms across the world are poised for some emperial wrath.
The Norwegian powerhouse waste no time laying into their Nietzschean anthem Thus Spake The Nightspirit, and it’s clear from the outset that we’re in for a treat tonight. Ihsahn, Samoth and Trym are joined on stage by Tony ‘Secthdamon’ Ingebrigtsen on bass and Jørgen Munkeby of SHINING: this is a proven line-up, and a well-rehearsed one too. A further trio from Anthems To The Welkin At Dusk completes the suite, with an especially rapturous rendition of With Strength I Burn closing out the ensemble. “Tonight we intend to go all the way back to the beginning,” declares Ihsahn.
Following a brief intermission, EMPEROR circa 1992 are reformed live on stage. Eyes turn to stage-left where Mortiis appears in full regalia and wielding a bass guitar once again. Together, they perform BATHORY’s Call From The Grave and their own Wrath Of The Tyrant. This is nostalgia intermingled with novelty, but we’re never any worse off for seeing black metal’s own Goblin King on stage. Faust’s appearance is likewise just a novelty but, for members of the LGBTQ+ community and their allies, having him appear without a public statement of apology or remorse (nor even an acknowledgment of his heinous crime) is simply unacceptable. His performance adds nothing but an aura of exclusivity to the occasion, with a bitter taste to boot. We hope that EMPEROR stop inviting Faust to perform at occasions like this. (For a more complete discussion of the issue, we recommend last month’s Hell Bent For Metal episode, The Faust and the Furious.)
An explosive rendition of Curse You All Men! brings the pace back up again, and the contrast is night and day. The presentation is painstakingly clear tonight; almost to a fault. Of course the atmosphere and production of In The Nightside Eclipse is something unto itself, but somehow The Majesty Of The Nightsky and I Am The Black Wizards sound more like themselves tonight. Munkeby deserves praise for his part: adding a fresh vibrancy to the synthesiser elements and brightening them up without completely changing their character. Ihsahn has gone on to develop some remarkable arrangements in his solo career, but with such a tight delivery you can hear that sophisticated song writing in nascent form in tonight’s material.
Anthemic Inno A Satana wraps up the In The Nightside Eclipse suite, and the band return to the stage to encore with the speed and majesty of Ye Entrancemperium. While EMPEROR have delivered a superb performance this evening, we can’t have been alone in expecting less emphasis on the classics and much more on the earlier material. Playing some older tracks like Night Of The Graveless Souls or Moon Over Kara-Shehr would really have set this event apart, and made more of the 1992 reunion line-up. With appearances from faces both welcome and unwelcome and a disappointingly conventional setlist, you would be forgiven for being a little underwhelmed with EMPEROR’s inaugural livestream. All the same, we think the black metal legends have redeemed themselves with an impassioned performance which reached out beyond the screen. This bodes well for EMPEROR’s next tour – whenever that might be.
Rating: 7/10