Review by Felix on December 8, 2023.

Armnatt’s „Eternal Flame“ was their third full-length and the first one that did not clock in after 25 or 26 minutes. Oh no, the album is a quantity monster. It offers opulent 30 minutes of music. This indicates either a lack of substance or an affinity for short, nearly punk-like infusions of hatred. Honestly speaking, to me it seems to be a mix of both. On the one hand, the pretty crude and unatural sound with a lot of reverb on it, cannot discover how primitive some guitar lines are („Dark Moon Rising“). With a sound reduced to the essentials, this would be typical fast-paced punk. And when we speak of punk, the lack of substance is not too far away, or is anybody out there of the opinion that this genre has a more solid basis than metal? Ridiculous. Punk is the art to make a lot out of nothing and it wastes no thought about building a resilient foundation.

In view of the obscure and nearly surreal production, the material suffers from an overdose of artificial aroma. Maybe the band has had more good ideas than I am able to realize, but everything gets lost in the foggy void the sound creates. Of course, there are some cruel shrieks and the instrumental section is not lacking in destructiveness. But the more I hear, the more I understand the concept of the minimalist playtime. This monotonous music of the category “lumberjack gone insane” gets tiring quickly. The sum is less than the addition of its single parts. Each and every of the (seven) regular tracks has a certain charm, no doubt about it. If the album had been released in the mid-eighties, maybe we would praise it as the punky black metal brother of Bathory’s debut. There is this raw and unflappable attitude that combines both works. However, “Eternal Flame” was released in 2021 and from my point of view, this was a more or less senseless action.

Anyway, those of you who like a badly produced version of bands like Impaled Nazarene that spit on any form of atmosphere for the benefit of musical destruction will probably (but only probably!) like this explosive noise collection. I appreciate the fact that the band does not focus on commercial success and I am sure they wanted to enrich the extreme metal scene. That’s good. But this alone does not necessarily lead to a strong album. Sometimes the result is completely mediocre. As much as I regret it, “Eternal Flame” is the evidence.

Rating: 5 out of 10