There are a few uninteresting certainties in life (birth, taxes, death, blah blah) and then there are also some really bloody important ones. Seeing the name Inferno and the label Debemur Morti is generally enough to get salivation maximised and drooling initiated. So, on their ninth album, and the fourth since they shifted from more traditional second wave black metal into more dissonant realms, have these mysterious shrouded figures from Czechia done it again?
While we are on the subject, another thing is now a surety. Inferno album titles are very long, very wordy and take a bit of working out. As I sit with a coffee and the glowing arms of the morning sun gliding through an open window, I find myself looking up the definition of ‘sophism’ because I can’t remember. My Greek studies tell me it’s something to do with knowledge. Google tells me I am vaguely right.
2021’s ‘Paradeigma (Phosphenes of Aphotic Eternity)’ was one of my favourite records of that year and I was fortunate to see a spellbinding performance at Fortress Festival in Scarborough on that album cycle. Inferno are hypnotically captivating and carry that dense and swirling vortex that would be akin to some Blut Aus Nord offerings, and all Ruins of Bevarast and Abduction offerings. On ‘The Anthropic Sophisms’ they have taken that signature sound yet extended it it into more thought provoking. slightly more cosmic and mindbendingly wonderful realms of audio titillation. Yes, I said titillation.
This record consists of four lengthy tracks (as you would expect – there is nothing short about this band), with titles to match. Opener, the unusually snappily named ‘Fission of the Soul’ starts off where their previous record left off and is quite reminiscent of the very comparable ‘The Thules Grimoires’ by the aforementioned Ruins of Bevarast. But is on the third track, the walloping ‘With Raving Mouths They Utter Things Mirthless, Unadorned and Unperfumed’ that the band really enter the next phase of their existence. This is an unsettling, slowly building strata-rich composition of the most perfect dissonance that atmospheric black metal has to offer.
Is this Inferno’s most engaging record to date? Of course not, because they are, or at least have become, streets ahead of most others. Of their latter period, this stands up there as being as unbelievably flawless as the rest, and will be getting spun and spun through 2026.
Best Paired With: A Pair Of Space Glasses, Lying On Your Back In A planetarium, and A Shot Of Blue Curacao.
Reviewed By Jaff.
Inferno – The Anthropic Sophisms (On The Heights of Despair) is out now on Debemur Morti Productions.
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