Review by Arek on June 27, 2025.

This album was one of the essential death metal albums and showcased the band flourishing on all cylinders.  There is a dark atmosphere here to the work and it is heavy and powerful.  The album pulls all the right punches to make a huge impact on the listener.  It is a very sizzling display of death metal might and an exciting addition to their discography.

The musicianship on the album is quite stellar with cascading guitars and has a production job that is top notch.  The entire affair is heavy and brutal and makes good use of distortion to a maximum effect to captivate the listener.  The band would have more well performed albums in the future, but this is certainly a highlight.

In terms of flaws, the album doesn’t have some of the positive traits of Unholy Cult and Majesty and Decay and this comes up a little wanting and is not the masterpiece of alums like Human and simply another excellent album by the band.

Overall, this album was an entertaing diversion and one of the strongest that the band has put out to date.  It is an influential album to bands like Behemoth and Nile and very interesting to listen to.  Fans of the heavy end of death metal will find like with as will those liking heavy music in general.

Rating: 7.7/10

Review by Felix on May 9, 2019.

Mystic Circle were probably not the most authentic black metal band from Germany and many members of the scene made jokes about both the image and the music of the band. Honestly speaking, not without good reasons. I admit that I did not realize it immediately, but already the artwork is slightly embarrassing with this woman in the moon that shows her vampire teeth. However, this does not say much about the music, if I am not mistaken. The production is of higher relevance, but sorry, it also does not hit the bull's eye. Flat guitars are accompanied by a lifeless snare, the bass guitar is missing due to whatever reason. Especially the fast parts suffer from a lack of atmosphere. All in all, the mix spreads a rather amateurish flair.

But now it's time to speak about the music and the first thing I must say is: too many female vocals! Mystic Circle show their version of the tiring the-beauty-and-the-beast-approach in each and every track. Unfortunately, neither the female nor the male vocals convince, and they bring stupid lyrics to the light of day: 

"I will love you forever my dear" "Hahaha you lie" / "I love you for all my life" / "No you fucking lie". 

This is not the only flaw. Maybe due to the emotionless production, the rapid sequences of the single tracks lie in close proximity to each other. Just like the lyrics, they are executed without any form of finesse and aggravating the situation, they lack catchiness. In other words: the melodies are pretty ill-defined. Some atmospheric breaks try to introduce further facets of the band's portfolio, but they are not cleverly integrated and so they appear as a kind of stand-alone solutions. The result comes as no surprise, a homogeneous overall impression is completely missing. The entire first half does not deliver really interesting sections. The band commutes between a clumsy copy of Cradle of Filth and pretty conventional melodic black metal without reaching the class of hordes such as Ancient. Vehemence or (fairly dark) romanticism? Mystic Circle were not able to make a clear decision.

The output's second half is better, especially because of "Kiss from a Vampire". To my big surprise, this is a real highlight. Here works the concept of the band excellently. A very catchy bridge and the compact chorus crown a powerful number and even the female vocals do not ruin the track. Instead they convey at least a small portion of dedication. "Octobermoon" has a partly good melody and the chorus of "Medina (Satan's Whore)" possesses a slightly demonic touch and a more or less good flow. Too bad that its cheesy bondage intermezzo sucks. It is as ordinary as lyrics like "she stands there with leathercloths". So, I bet you can understand that this album is nothing else but black metal from the pretty greasy third or fourth quality tier. Debutants have the right to fail occasionally, but here the failure has become the norm.

Rating: 4 out of 10

Review by Krys on February 21, 2001.

Finally we have an Immolation album that was released one year after the previous one. And what a piece of music it is. What really amazes me is that material on "Close To A World Below", even though produced in less time than any other Immolation album, is better than ever before. I just have one piece of advice for the band: Release albums every year, damn it!

Always in shadow of big brothers like Morbid Angel or Cannibal Corpse (although not any more!), Immolation’s 'Close To A World Below' belongs to one of the best releases in death metal sector of the year 2000. What can I say about this album? Let’s start by saying that if you had attention deficit problems prior to listening to this album, you might need professional care afterward!


In the guitar department, Thomas Wilkinson & Robert Vigna take you on an insane and complex trip through the madhouse where drummer Alex Hernandez with ultrasonic speed will pound your head with a baseball bat and Ross Dolan will scream, moan and growl until you see monkeys take over the world. (I had to do it for 'Atomic', he loves them. Monkeys, of course!) I tell you, it’s a beautiful feeling knowing that there are bands like Immolation that create brutal but also atmospherically insane music without using keyboards or any special effects; just a little headbanger’s how-to-create-a-band tool kit - guitars and drums. Just beautiful!


"Close To A World Below" should be Immolation’s final break-through, which they fully deserve and have my absolute support. Album not recommended to people with short attention spans.


Ratting: 8.5 out of 10