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Track Listing: In Blood - Devour This Sanctity Rise To Fall And Fall To Rise Blood Magick Necromance Discipline Through Punishment Angeli Mortis De Profundis Impaled Upon the Tongue Of Sathan Possessed Burning Eyes Sado Messiah

Blood Magick Necromance is the 9th album from Austrian black metal outfit Belphegor, and their first release since 2009.

The album begins with the track "In Blood-Devour This Sanctity", with no intro or warning. Everything comes at you full force, but the awesome effect slowly wears off with the lack of diversity in the riff patterns. I'm not saying this is necessarily a "bad" song; everything just seems to run together in a lackluster and boring way.

The next couple of tracks follow in the same fashion, but each of them has their own saving grace; the intense drumming on "Rise to Fall and Fall to Rise", the incredible razor-like precision guitar playing on "Blood Magick Necromance", and the eerie and haunting clean intro to "Discipline through Punishment."

The album really seems to pick up by the 5th track, "Angeli Mortis De Profundis", where everything seems to go into hyper drive. The riffs are far more diverse on this track, and the speed is simply incredible.

The pinnacle of this album is the song "Impaled upon the Tongue of Satan." It seems that Belphegor spent some serious time thinking this song out and orchestrating it in such a fantastic fashion, but I can't help but think they looked to Dimmu Borgir for inspiration. The vocals on this track are instantly reminiscent of Shagrath's work on In Sorte Diaboli, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.

The last two tracks are incredible pieces of work as well, from the melodic riffing on "Possessed Burning Eyes 1997", to the very emotional feeling groove of "Sado Messiah."

Overall, Blood Magick Necromance is an enthusiastic and respectable endeavor from a band as great as Belphegor, but something is definitely missing. I can't quite put my finger on it, but they seem to be missing a key element to their sound. Whatever the case may be, Blood Magick Necromance is definitely worth checking out, and is most definitely worth a purchase.