Review Summary: ctrl+f "hard"
Arctic Thunder.
That simple combination of words alone should tell you how much this rules. And it does, hard. Named after some underground '80s metal band that no doubt rules dick, Arctic Thunder is Darkthrone's SEVENTEENTH studio album, and it goes ***ing hard. As if there was any doubt.
Its unbelievable that Fenriz and the other guy could have lasted this long and ruled this hard so consistently but they have and they do. Theres not many metal bands that can put out career high albums 30 years in, but the ones that do are part of a pretty prestigious group, Iron Maiden's
Book of Souls, Voivod's
Target Earth, Slayer's
Awakened from the Abyss for example... wait what?
anyway, this album goes hard. the drums go hard, the vox go hard, but most importantly the riffs go HARD. maybe a little less hard than Underground Resistance but that album was basically the diamond standard of how hard an album can go so give em a bit of slack if this one doesn't quite match it.
Arctic Thunder continues the '80s metal punk style of the the last few Darkthrone albums, but with a slight twist, seeing a return of some of the black metal elements, like the tremolo picking in opener “Tundra Leech,” that made the band so damn good in the first place. Couple that with some doomy influenced sections and you have a relatively unique album in Darkthrone's discog that is definitely worth a listen for those that aren't dedicated fans.
Nocturno Culto and Fenriz have killed it again this year with Arctic Thunder, and they don't look like stopping any time soon. Check it out boys… HARD.
btw the cowbell on “Boreal Fiends”
*** yeah
