This is old school black crossed with Shatraug metal, or put another way, Mercyful Fate meets Sargeist, can’t go wrong with that. At first I didn’t even read the logo, just popped the cd in and looked at the cover art. It would hold up well as a King Diamond cover and I figured this would be melodic commercial black/traditional metal. The sparse booklet is suitably illustrated in Tales From The Crypt fashion and the album is divided into side Attics and side Catacombs. Once you get past the intro, this is more straight up Scandinavian black metal, not commercialized at all, and I got thinking about the name, Dust Is Everywhere, and figured all the good names are already taken and this band just formed in 2006, but D.I.E. is a serviceable name.

This is typically harsh black vocals, ranging from low growl to mid range shriek and the music has the obligatory fast and rhythmic sections and the slow and rhythmic sections. The guitars are controlled solos, reasonably well executed, with sparingly used melodic solos like in the middle of “Horrid Places.” The drummer does his share of blastbeats but knows better than to just blaze away outpacing the guitarists. He manages quite a varied delivery. The rhythm section generates quite a bit of energy in the faster sections and they manage to keep the intensity up on the slower passages as well. The slower passages have some nice hooks and throughout the album melody is balanced with blasting fury.

This is a fine introductory release. It is evident some effort was put into this, and it is sure to cause the majority of metalheads to cringe and cover their ears, as every black metal disk ought to do. This is not a stand out album but it is quite well executed and definitely proves D.I.E. is a band to watch for in the future. Notable songs are “Horrid Places” which I swear has a cat meowing two minutes in, and “Inhaling Cryptic Air.” Just now I visited their myspace page and it seems the band agrees with me, those are the two songs available to listen to. If you hurry you can be the 140th person to visit this year.

[Visit the band's website]

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