Review by Felix on February 15, 2021.

For four albums, The Haunted were special to me. No album was excellent from front to back, but there were some extremely strong songs to discover. I liked that. Even today I still have the CD insert of a Metal Hammer issue at hand, which contained the bonus song of the Swedish pressing of One Kill Wonder. Then came The Dead Eye, a record that made me think I was the owner of a dead ear. Or even two dead ears. But I didn't want to part with The Haunted with such a shitty record. Besides, everyone deserves a second chance and yada yada yada, you know the drill. So I bought the special edition of Versus with four bonus tracks on a second CD. To start here: these offer a relatively fast-paced but still rather expressionless piece 'Seize the Day', a nice but unspectacular instrumental (ironically the title track 'Versus') and two bland pieces that come and go without resonating in any way. Well, you think, that's the way it is with rejects and try to rejoice in the fact that Devolve at least transports an edgy aggressiveness. Nevertheless, compositionally everything remains on a manageable level.

Never mind, there are certainly better titles on the main body of work.... well, let yourself be surprised. Let's talk about the production first. Here, The Haunted manage to appear quite hard, modern and crystal clear. The guitars have a cutting tone, the drums unleash their full force and the bass doesn't come up short either. Dolving's vocals are also well staged. The fact that he exaggerates a bit in his I-am-the-hardest-asocial-acting is another story, as is the obnoxiousness of his whiny intermezzos ('Pieces', 'Rivers Run'). But as I said, the mix is fine and it's ironic that it's the technical, not the musical, side of the band that lastly adds a touch of extra class.

But now to the eleven songs themselves. At times, The Haunted regain their former strength, but they obviously no longer have confidence in their old strength. 'Little Cage' starts strong and has a tingling, heavy part, but is slowed down by an inadequately melodic part. Simply living out three minutes of pure aggression is no longer possible for the band or simply too primitive. (Only the auspiciously named album highlight 'Crusher' makes an exception.) One would like to kick people with such potential in the ass for this sin of omission. But I've heard that's forbidden, so I don't do it. Instead, I tolerate being maltreated with hard, but mostly poorly conceived melodies that often ruin the good approaches. Somehow all the material sounds to me as if The Haunted would have liked to have had a difficult childhood in the Bronx. But unfortunately their mum made them hot chocolate in the Swedish province and read them Pippi Longstocking as a bedtime story. This leads to deductions in the authenticity rating (also because I find Sweden very beautiful). In addition, total failures like 'Ceremony' worsen the overall picture.

All in all, Versus appears as an album that wants to impress with a natural heaviness, a few thrash elements, many melodic segments and different moods. But a diverse portfolio does not guarantee a good or even average album and Dolving’s vocals are rather self-loving than charismatic. He can play the desperate and angry guy next door while screaming “just stay the f**k away from me” ('Iron Mask'), but don’t worry, I didn’t intend to visit him. No doubt, The Haunted leave more on Versus than they pick up. Solid pieces like the two closing tracks flatten a lot, but the album is still the result of too many wrong decisions. Consequently, I remained “unseen” at the release of their next album.

Rating: 5 out of 10

Review by Fernando on November 2, 2022.

The mystics behind Ateiggär, Fauth Temenkeel and Fauth Lantav (aka Mentekel and Vâlant from Ungfell), after giving the world a taste of darkness with the 2019 EP Us D'r Höll Chunnt Nume Zyt, have finally returned with a proper debut opus, and on MMXXII anno horriblis, through Eisenwald, Tyrannemord is upon us.

Ateiggär is of course one of the many projects from The Helvetic Underground Committee, known for acts like Ungfell and Dakhma, and for also being a collective of eclectic extreme metal bands, and where Ateiggär is concerned, they play pure, true cult black metal in the style of early Satyricon and Kvist, that is to say, a very melodic and epic style of black metal that features varied songwriting and extensive use of keyboards and orchestral arrangements. The band displayed that style and with their own flare very well on their 2019 EP, and now that they're presenting a full length LP, the stakes are higher, and I can safely say that Ateiggär did not disappoint and this record is their definitive statement wherein they completely shed their influences.

Much like the debut EP, Tyrannemord is also a concept album, which accounts the assassination of Byzantine ruler Leo Armenius V, on a palace's chapel, while also drawing influence from the works of German poet and playwright Andreas Gryphius. And indeed, the band have very lofty and grandiose themes and concepts to enrich their music, and on that regard, they absolutely deliver black metal that's equal parts unrelenting and majestic. Fauth Temenkeel has often proved himself to be a versatile and dynamic songwriter and musician, and with Ateiggär, and especially on this record, his mastery of the subgenre and more esoteric influences truly shine. His guitar and bass work in particular is the most striking, his melodic and oppressing riffs and basslines form the backbone of the songs, and what's more impressive is how the strings for the most part are on the lower scale and the heavier sounding side, and feature a growling and exceedingly thick sound, the keyboards and synths do most of the heavy lifting when it comes to melodies and embellishments, and all this is rounded by his vocals which are on the guttural and echoing, from beginning to end, Temenkeel never lets up, and it gives this very symphonic record a true grit and rawness that other "epic" or symphonic black metal records often discard or lose altogether due to a sterile production.

That being said, while Fauth Temenkeel does have the lion's share of the instrumentation, his partner in crime, Fauth Lantav is by no means a slouch, the man has long proven himself to be a superb drummer, and his work speaks for itself, and that is still the case on this record, and more impressively, Lantav's drumming is the backbone of all the songs, his fills, rhythms, blast beats and double bass are fiendishly effective throughout and their absence in key ambient moments have more impact when they come back.

The last aspect to mention is the production, The Helvetic Underground Committee have always had a knack for producing black metal that's both professionally made but without diminishing the grit of black metal, and that's still the case for Tyrannemord, all the instruments are clear sounding, and the performances are excellent. The most interesting aspect however is the in-studio trickery, like the reverb and delay on the drums, distorted flanger guitars in bridge sections, and even samples of birds and choruses, and all of these elements complete the atmosphere of the record which also enhances the music and fully embodies the concept and themes in the lyrics, and while I don't speak Swedish German, the idea of a regicide within a house of worship does come across from the music. The only real critic I can offer is that the album is a bit uniform and falls a bit into monotony, but only by inches and through repeated listens, and given how ornate and massive the music as a whole is, I wouldn't recommend listening this record on repeat but that's just a disclaimer.

Overall, Ateiggär have truly nailed finding their sound and creating a massive album that's both vintage, yet fresh, with both ambitious songwriting and superb performances, this is not just a great addition for the Helvetic Pantheon, but a great record to listen on its own.

Best tracks: 'En Stille Feind', 'Us Lyschegiftig Schlaf Verwached', 'Chron' Und Tod'

Rating: 8.9 out of 10