Immortal – All Shall Fall (2009) Review

Immortal has risen from the white ashes to reclaim their throne as kings of black metal. Not many bands have been as important to a genre of music as Immortal has been to black metal over the years. Now the band is back with their first album in seven years, All Shall Fall.

The album carries on exactly where Sons Of Northern Darkness finished. Stylistically All Shall Fall is extremely similar, the guitars are very melodic and as a whole the album stays at the same familiar pressing pace without going overboard. The frostbitten trio show no signs of cobwebs, but there is also no apparent attempt to create something truly spectacular. All Shall Fall, although a brilliant come-back album, is a bit too steady and safe to be hailed as one of the band’s greatest works.

Seven years is an extremely long time and it is perhaps unrealistic to have expected anything to the standard of At The Heart Of Winter or any of the band’s other classics. All Shall Fall almost seems like the band are just firing up the engine, and it is the future we have to wait for to experience Immortal at their most devastating. With this said, All Shall Fall is still a remarkably enjoyable album to listen to and is very much an album suited for the times.

The opening title track sounds like the soundtrack to a bleak and icy armageddon and “The Rise Of Darkness” follows bringing forth the rhythmic march of the northern tyrants. Melodic plodder “Norden On Fire” brings down the pace, but “Arctic Swarm” soon whips up another blizzard being the most forceful and unrelenting storm on the album.

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