I love it when I come across 1990s symphonic black metal that is operating at a truly crazed and eccentric level. Here's another primo offering in that vein, ablaze beneath the Southern Cross ! Man, this is some wicked antipodean kosmik-symphonic black metal imperialism. I really dug this somewhat-recent reissue from Nuclear War Now, who obviously has their mitts deep in the Australian black/death underground - this obscure band was a standout in the mid-1990s Sydney underground, while being virtually unknown outside of their region at the time. And they delivered "symphonic" black metal before that sound really began to get codified - the prominent keyboards wash over the hyperfast precision blast beats and ripping riffs, and along with the scathing shrieks and almost operatic choral vocals, present something that's as striking, icy, and novel as what other early bands in the field (like Norway's Limbonic Art, Arctutus, and Troll) were doing in roughly the same time period.

But this colossal (sixty-four minute) 1997 album (originally released on Warhead Records) also demonstrates the band's own twisted brand of pseudo-orchestral blast weirdness and epic catchiness that emerges at all the right points on these sprawling songs, like the decaying melodies and morose operatic synth-chorales at the end of "Crystal Lakes" (a killer opening track), the dense string-like texture that bathes "Hall Of Sorrow" as berserker squiggling guitar shredding bursts from its interiors, and some rad gothy Tom Warrior-esque moaning on a number of songs. There are some awesomely odd bass lines on "Freezing Ornate Throne" that thrust it into a schizoid mode, a smattering of harpsichord darkness, some really cool, really odd-sounding vibraphone on "Under The Darkest Shade". The keyboards on many of the songs have an old-school "horror score" feel that soaks into the black metal nicely; it's almost like hearing keys from an old Empire Pictures film integrated with the music; I really get that vibe from the slower, grinding moments in stuff like "In The Icy Realm" and the strangely beautiful title track, which also features some lovely crystalline guitar melodies that feel like they drifted off some 90's slowcore band. Definitely digging that a lot.

A superb combo of frosty grandeur and blasting blackened violence, frenzied tumbling riffs raking over the bombastic keyboards and tireless rhythm section. At times quite mesmeric, and others erupting into a swirling chaos. That drumming is all drum-machine generated, and it injects a somewhat clinical precision into the otherwise tangled and ferocious frost-visions on Thorns - I'm a fan of the marriage of keyboards / synthesizers / electronics and drum machines in black and death metal, so this hits a certain spot for me. And there's this weird, almost dreamlike current of hypnotic otherworldliness running through all eleven songs, making this album mesmeric and maniacal at the same time. Combined with Lord Kaos's lyrics (which almost read like Decadent-influenced poetry) and Thorns Of Impurity's surrealistic cover art, this album serves up a different kind of sympho-blast lunacy. It's certainly some kind of anomaly in 90's-era Aussie black / death. I don't think I've heard anything else like it come out of that country from that time frame, so it's a really interesting (and intense) album from a couple of different angles. Definitely something I'd recommend to enthusiasts / addicts of the more "bent" entries in older "symphonic" and keyboard-driven black metal; Lord Kaos was certainly not another run-of-the-mill "symphonic" BM act. Main member Astennu later moved to Norway for a period of time, playing guitar for heavyweights Covenant, Carpe Tenebrum, and most notably a brief stint in Dimmu Borgir, which feels like a perfect fit for his sweeping, magisterial sound-vision.

The double LP edition comes in a gatefold jacket and includes a twenty page booklet.