I can’t really think of too many bands out there who are as metal as Deströyer 666… This outfit has been plagued by so-called controversies their entire career and they’re of no concern to me. I’m passionate about black metal, so the more controversial and the more abrasive the better! Give me Nodveidt, Taake, Satanic Warmaster, Gaahl, Infernus, Michayah Belfagor and all the rest of black metal’s fabled miscreants. After all, that’s where the best music is found.
Fact is, we live in a world that’s become a frail version of itself where REAL metal people like our boys here are looked upon as relics due to their honest and un-PC ways of viewing the world. You see, Deströyer 666 represents the adversarial, the bestial and the violent – their music a testament to free will and spirit – stuff that’s just too strong to bend to the whines and snivels of all the broke-dick PC warriors out there who’ve infested today’s international metal scene. Got your attention? Good.
Leather clad and looking like something you definitely want to avoid on the street as usual, Deströyer 666 are back, and in the spirit of those old steel town dives and haunts, they’re bringing with them the kind of old fashioned heavy metal thunder you generally don’t get within the realm of black metal. On December 2, Deströyer 666 released their latest volume, “Never Surrender” via Season of Mist.
With “Never Surrender”, aside from the usual flagrant levels of warmongering and Motörhead worship, you can expect a purely NWOBHM-inspired affair: anthemic choruses, evenly tempo’d progressions, galloping rhythms and triumphant solos – all delivered with street-level punk attitude and blackened to perfection. The opening titular track priming the motor with greasy riffs, wailing leads and jam-session-level disregard for reservation. It’s been six years and this cut definitely feels like the re-introduction to the band I needed as it embodies much of what D666 does well.
“Proper metal” as frontman KK Warslut puts it is another thing that this posse does better than most. “Pitch Black Night” offering the purest alloys forged in the wildest fires of Hell – a balls-deep in the c~nt of innocence kind of track that stokes the age olde flames of rebellion into a blaze with every maniacal chorus and incinerating lead. Riff mastery put on display in the following cut, “Mirror’s Edge”, along with a little BM action in the form of gorgeous, almost ethereal tremolos and chants melding together seamlessly with the album’s dominant heavy metal aesthetic. All done the Deströyer 666 way with no f~cks to give and in honor of the wolf. The album closes with “Batavia’s Graveyard”. Somewhere upon some desolate and sullen shore is where you’ll find yourself in these final minutes before all things epic and soulful unfold… Eyes closed and fists clenched here as you take in yet another soul-igniting closer to yet another D666 opus.
I believe that all metal should – at least in some part – be inspired by the NWOBHM. After all, that’s where it all started and to say that Deströyer 666 doesn’t do this better than anyone else would be a lie. And to all the weak offended souls? As long as bands like Deströyer 666 are out there to offend and spit in the face of the herd, I’m happy. So, strap on your denim & leather, fire up the iron horse, grab this world by the balls and hoist your renegade flag high. The wolves are loose again and only those with the testicular fortitude required to run with the hunt are invited. Are you worthy?
9/10
Experience “Never Surrender” by Deströyer 666 right here:
REVIEW BY JEGER
