Metal Millennium Album Reviews | Immortal

                                      Immortal : At the Heart of Winter

After losing Demonaz to tendenitis (he still writes the lyrics), Immortal returns once again to a two man line up. But this time with Abbath doing all the guitar, bass, vocal work and Horgh tackling the drumming. I had no clue what Immortal had up their sleeve this time, but i was going to find out at all costs.

Wow, this is a comeback album if I have heard one. Immortal has slowed things down a lot, and instead of using their trademark of blazing guitars (Abbath can still shred mind you) with superfast drumming, they have gone on more of a thrash route and have incorporated
technical riffs with quality drumming to make this album a winner. The production on the album is terrific (which is a tremendous improvement from their previous albums) so you can actually hear how Abbath is picking and he still belts out the vocals like no other. "Withstand The Fall of Time" is one of the golden moments on the cd with some incredible guitar work, mixing high fast riffs with low ones to make a nice balanced sound. Horgh has improved alot and follows up the guitar work with some nice drumming that fits the album very nicely. But no other part on this cd caught me off guard as much as the midpoint of "Tragedies Blows At Horizon". Abbath switches to a clean guitar with very precise picking that sounds amazing, which made me rewind the cd many times to hear it again. Plus, to think that wasn't enough, "At The Heart Of Winter" has a nice breezy intro to it before incorporating yet another clean guitar riff into the cd.

Immortal have come back with an album that has all the varity, uniqueness and production that "Blizzard Beasts" lacked and will appeal to any metal fan out there. Amazing!

                                          Overall score: 90/100
Reviewed by Brian