Review by Michael on April 27, 2026.

I actually knew that Swedish black-thrash legends Bewitched were in the studio lately to record some new stuff because the guys told me so at the last "Under The Black Sun" festival but this was quite surprising anyway. Titled "Diabolical Death Mass", their new album was released on April 24th via Osmose Productions.

So what to say now about this one? The promo told us that this album is no resurrection because Bewitched were never dead. "BEWITCHED deliver 11 tracks true to the traditional old-school black-thrash sound that made them known: savage riffs, anthemic power, and pure blackened fury. An uncompromising Hellcult attack, nothing more and nothing less. […] Let the ritual begin."

Wow, okay, those are some grandiloquent words and what can I say to this? Fuck yeah!!! Forget the half-baked "Rise Of The Antichrist" from 2002 which still had some cool riffs on board and REALLY forget the not even luke-warm "Spiritual Warfare" which was more or less a super uninspired accumulation of lame riffs and turned out one of the biggest disappointments in the history of black-thrash metal when it comes to my personal opinion.

But "Diabolical Death Mass" is totally different from these two previous ones. This is a quasi direct continuation of the first two albums "Diabolical Desecration" and "Pentagram Prayer" which let the night burn back in the 90s.

Fast aggressive riffing, cool Celtic Frost urgh-screams and thunderous drums make out the ten songs plus the mandatory "a baby is screaming, let's sacrifice it to Lucifer"-intro. On this album there are really no flaws, each one kicks ass and is a joy to listen to. All the songs breathe the spirit of the first two albums (if you are a little bit critical, you could even say that some of the songs sound pretty much the same as the first two albums) and out comes a furious black-thrash inferno.

With "(Fear The) Revenge Of The Ripper" they weave the story of "Blade Of The Ripper" a little bit furthermore and here you can clearly hear out that Bewitched wanted to step back in their career and don't need any evolution. Fantastic. The riffs are much the same like in the other Ripper song and this makes you feel quite comfortable.

Okay, no evolution is a little bit exaggerated though. Sometimes you hear some classic heavy metal riffs here and there which they didn't dare to play (or weren't able to) but this makes this album even more enjoyable.

What I first did not like too much was the slightly thinned out vocals by Vargher but I don't know if I got used to it now or if the vocals are getting more powerful with the ongoing running time of the album. And let's be honest, time even doesn't stop for our black-thrash heroes, does it?

So there is just one question remaining – will this one be the best black-thrash record in 2026 or will it be the new Cruel Force? Or will it turn out to be a draw?

Rating: 9.5 out of 10