I can only heartedly agree with Roy’s point of view, LEVIATHAN’s new opus is so extreme, it is almost hard to stand. Whoever listened to the bands Roy mentioned or the likes of BETHLEHEM, ABYSSIC HATE or other visions-of-suicide-creating acts, should get an idea of what "The Tenth Sub Level Of Suicide" is about. Songs like ‘Fucking Your Ghost In Chains Of Ice’ or the aforementioned tracks are forlorn, violent, depressive, soultearing monuments that you will not be able to listen to every day, because it will kill you!!! But every once in a while you should indulge in the shivering, wailing screams and the triumphant riffs of LEVIATHAN. More than 70 minutes of musical and atmospheric intensity and pitch blackness, what more can you ask for. I think after listening to this album various kiddie Black Metal bands will either change their style or give up, because you have to be extremely fucked up to create art like LEVIATHAN did with "The Tenth Sub Level Of Suicide" and I think only few people really want to end that way. I do not want to feel like this and I don’t want to know what hardships you have to go through to be able to come up with such a Black Metal masterpiece, but I do not want to miss this fantastic CD. An MP3 file is available at www.moribundcult.com.

Sadly in our more and more commercial scene it turns out to be the bands that are in the ranks of the major labels that sell most. This, of course, doesn’t mean those bands’ music is the best. Oh yes, great production is not a point anymore as every band on (in example Nuclear Blast) has so-called great production. But, there are also all those who claim that DarkThrone’s “Transilvanian Hunger” has a bad production. And now Leviathan surprise me with one of the most depressive albums I have heard lately. This is, at least from my point of view, the most depressive album that has been spawned from the Black Metal scene the last three years. The album consists of ten tracks, where a couple are instrumentals trying to make you breathe for a second or two. As the playing time counts in a 70+ minutes, the album needs your patience, being the grower it is. The first aspect you have to surpass is the vocalisation. I don’t know for lyrics, but throughout the album I understood like two sentences. The rest is just screaming and howling, comparable to Burzum’s debut album. When you have gone beyond these screams, you can begin to concentrate on the music. About 60% of the album is mid-paced, 30% is rather fast and the last 10 is effects and instrumental music. This is not original in any sense, but the music surely has an effect. It is mesmerizing, and it hypnotizes you. The first couple of spins I even turned it off, because it sounded rather boring. Then it began to grow, and now, for the 10th time it is still growing. The prominent bass-lines which reveal themselves after a few listening-sessions creates the necessary depth to the music and makes me even more eager to listen to it once again. Just listen to ‘He Whom Shadows Move Towards’ and ‘Scenic Solitude And Leprosy’ to understand what I’m talking about, as the bass-lines in these track are catchy as hell, but not light in any sense. A couple of tracks really stand out, the first being ‘The Bitter Emblem Of Dissolve’ due to its catchiness. A mid-paced pounding rhythm sets the mood and lasts for about three minutes before it turns into a three minute long depressive travel into darkness. This is what I call an intelligent arrangement. The ninth track ‘The Idiot Sun’ have the most suicidal vocals I’ve heard for ages. The vocals are done better than those infamous Abruptum ones, because in Leviathan they have a purpose while I got the feeling that in Abruptum they were done just to be special. It’s like he chokes while the songs lasts, and that he tries to commit suicide. Being funny I could say he didn’t manage because the screams are ever present on the last track as well. “The Tenth Sub Level Of Suicide” is as Black Metal as it can be, and gives me hope that underground Metal won’t die. But, as I told you earlier in the review, you have to be patient before you want to commit your suicide. Listen to this albums a few times prior to that.