DARKTHRONE: PRE-HISTORIC METAL
ARCHIVED FROM LOUDER THAN WAR.
Darkthrone: Pre-Historic Metal
LP | CD | CS| DL
4.5/5
Darkthrone have just released their 21st studio LP, Pre-Historic Metal. The band is now 45 years into their career. They released a massive Box Set of early albums a couple of months ago to celebrate their definitive impact on the Black Metal genre.
Your washed-up and ex-corpse-painted scribe, Sean Millard, weighs in on Progress versus Nostalgia and comes down on the side of growth and evolution. It’s time to hail contemporary Darkthrone. He argues that their longevity and creativity resonate just as loudly as the output from those wayward kids of yesteryear…
Almost exactly two years ago, give or take a few days, Darkthrone released their last album, It Beckons Us All. This is significant, not only because it’s still ace and on regular rotation on both my turntable and in my car, but because it was the first review I wrote for these hallowed pages.
Now here we are in 2026, and Kolbotn’s favourite sons have followed up that LP with their next belter, Pre-Historic Metal, and I have the privilege to cover them again. Cause for celebration. For me, at least.
Just like the last record, I pre-ordered it. A record, cassette and LP Box Set, with an additional “player” vinyl copy and digital version for automotive entertainment. All picked up on release day from Peaceville’s distribution centre, joyously local to me in sunny Norwich. You might call me collector scum. I would probably describe my infatuation more accurately as fanaticism. I hold my hand high. Fuck it. Darkthrone are among my favourite-evers. They’ve never released a duffer to my ears and, FYI, are never likely ever to. So, if you’re hoping for a lack of bias right here, I’m sorry, out of luck. Never mind. Move on.
My thus-far extraordinarily accurate theory regarding the band’s inability to release a shit LP is proven correct, yet again, with Pre-Historic Metal. Of course, I love it. I was always going to. From the sarcastically wonderful sleeve art of the standard LP, featuring a pitchfork-wielding Fenriz in full Firmament Roar, to the dubiously tragic felt-tipped Cro-Magnon alternative artwork of the Box Set, my expectation was firmly set for a wondrous collection of magical riff-tastic treats that were impossible to anticipate coolly. It’s an extremely exciting event for me.
For those few readers unaware, Darkthrone released the first second-wave Black Metal LP, A Blaze In The Northern Sky, in 1992 although Mayhem had released the Deathcrush EP in 1987 and could be cited as the real pioneers of what would end up being called True Norwegian Black Metal. They were honing their chaotic sound live for five years before Darkthrone pipped them to the post by being the first to commit the harsh stylings to an LP, in all its icy and lo-fi glory.
By doing so, they established the ground rules that so many bands would adopt as their own. Burzum, Satyricon, Enslaved, Dimmu Borgir, Gorgoroth, Immortal and a million others would jump from the homespun flaming spires that Da Frönes had built. From there, those bands would all deliver their own interpretations of that same blueprint, with added orchestration, ‘higher’ production values and differing levels of tune-smithery. But despite all the varied reworkings of the core sound over the years, no one has really come close to Darkthrone’s definitive rawness.
As time went on, the band refined their sound and went through numerous phases of metallic homage on future LPs; from bringing elements of thrash, hardcore, punk, NWOBHM and Christ-knows-what-else into the mix. Their willingness to experiment without constraint (and revel in their own giddy fandom) has meant that the band has remained compelling and enthralling, even when the (very) occasional LP is more miss than hit. There’s always something interesting delivered. They are forgiven their mistakes and praised for their disregard for criticism. At least, by me. Darkthrone just do what they want to do, regardless of trends, fads and Trve Kvlt judgements. They’re essentially untouchable.
The two members; Fenriz (mainly drums, but also some guitars and vocals) and Ted “Nocturno Culto” Skjellum (guitars and vocals) share writing duties and have become minor deities in the Black Metal world for their refusal to play live and to create music absolutely on their own terms. To the point, now, where it seems a nonsense to call them a BLACK Metal band at all.
They’re much more than that, despite their definitive impact on the genre in the 90s. They have become genre-less, in a way. Of course, their music is always METAL, but only in the broadest sense, with prog, trad and thrash metal being just as present in their writing as black, death or doom is. A refusal to conform imbues everything they do, perfectly balanced with the need to have riff-led old-fashioned FUN. In Lemmy’s words, they play Rock ‘n’ Roll. It’s (probably) as simple as that.
It has been just the two of them in Darkthrone since Transilvanian Hunger, their third Black Metal LP, in 1994. They’ve got a cool way of working. When they’re inspired to do so, they write and record. If they’re not, they don’t. Thankfully for ‘Frönes Fanatics, they’re a pair of fairly inspired individuals, so something new arrives from them every couple of years. Pre-Historic Metal is their 21st ‘proper’ studio LP. Amazing.
For Trve Kvltists, nothing compares to the band’s Unholy Trinity: A Blaze In The Northern Sky, Under A Funeral Moon and Transilvanian Hunger. These three albums cemented their reputation and defined a genre. It’s undeniable that those records are amazing and some of the best Black Metal ever recorded. One more “Full Black” LP came next, with the harsh Panzerfaust, in 1995. Then five exemplary Blackened Death/Thrash LPs peppered the next near-decade of activity, before the band’s love/hate mid-period of D-Beat Hardcore/NWOBHM-influenced fun dictated their trajectory until midway through the 2010s.
Their latest period, for me, has become their most interesting phase. It begins with Arctic Thunder in 2016 and has been followed every year or two with near-perfect examples a broadly old skool, Motörhead/Celtic Frost sound, with added psyche, punk and METAL seasoning. In 2019, we got the flawless Old Star, followed in fairly rapid succession by Eternal Hails, Astral Fortress, It Beckons Us All and now, Pre-Historic Metal.
Each ‘modern’ Darkthrone LP is different to the last, but the same riffy quality is drawn through each album, like gnarly nuggets of gold, sifted through silty river-bed filth. The standard is consistently high, inventive and engaging. The recordings are trademarked as reliably no-frills, no fuss and to the point. The playing is enthrallingly loose, rolling and proudly Metronome Free (since 1987, as it clearly states on the record sleeves). There’s a clear expectation of no bull from Darkthrone, and it’s a key reason their legions of fans love them so much. They can be trusted.
Dependably contrary and wilful; you either buy into the Darkthrone dream, or you don’t. They don’t give a fuck, either way. They do it because they need to, not for your benefit.
But here’s the rub, even if they don’t care what you think, I do. Because if you don’t buy in, your life is markedly less fun than it could be. A bit like choosing not to laugh at farts. And that makes me feel sad for you. It is that sadness that motivates me to write this down and to try to encourage you to listen to them. Darkthrone make me a better, altruistic person. A heavy metal evangelist. YOUR Heavy Metal Evangelist. This is the way.
Treating the post-2016 Darkthrone catalogue as its own discreet phase, Pre-Historic Metal beats It Beckons Us All. It probably takes Eternal Hails too, and even gives Astral Fortress a run for its money. You need to understand how high that praise is. It means that this latest LP is up there with Arctic Thunder and Old Star, which I consider two of the best Darkthrone LPs ever and, therefore, two of my personal favourite albums ever-EVER.
It is therefore safe to assume that I am hearing true greatness in Pre-Historic Metal. Will you? Maybe not, but I’m going to do my best to try and convince you to open your ears and give it a go, at the very least. What have you got to lose? If you’re even faintly a fan of METAL – in all its varied interpretations and grunting, over-driven glory – you owe it to yourself to prick up your ears.
Let the needle drop. I dare you not to launch a huge shit-eating grin when the opening riff of the sensationally titled “They Found One Of My Graves” kicks off the LP. My blood runs thinner and my heart races neck and neck with Nocturno Culto’s right wrist as the Venom-inspired thrum thunders out of the speakers, with the first lines of the album epitomising not only Darkthrone, but METAL in general:
“More often than never
There are days when God is absent
The terrible shudder of restless graves
Like a constant sleet in your mind.”
Go get ‘em, Ice-Viking Fly-Boys. It’s a brilliant opener that really sets the tone for what is about to come. The band sound more energised, engaged and dynamic than some cynics, somewhere, will argue they have for years.
That such magnificence can be achieved with reshaping such a minimal number of riffs in a song belies the band’s punk rock/neanderthal roots. Deliberately reigned in, the no frills philosophy of the band is exemplified by They Found One Of My Graves. A triumphant refrain brings the track to a satisfyingly epic close, complete with Star Trekking sweeps on a distant keyboard as the guitars fade away. Wonderful.
The now familiar string-bending main riff from preview track, Pre-Historic Metal, follows hot on the heels of ‘Graves. I liked it as a preview track, but it felt a little by-the-book, hampered somewhat by Fenriz’ vocals. I do wish he kept his hammy operatics to side projects like Coffin Storm and Isengard. He can’t do clean vocals. They add a level of comedy to proceedings that undermines the gravity of the riffing and songwriting.
You tend to come away with his vocal style, labelling a song’s level of success even when, as they are in this case, only sparsely cringey. Otherwise, the song is great. It works better situated as part of an album flow rather than in isolation as a single. Magnificent riffs, adulation of Metal in all its forms. Flicking between trad and doom-derived stylings as easily and quickly as a hooligan biker on a newly resurfaced by-pass.
Siberian Thaw is the most progressive track on the LP by some margin. It also contains my line of the album: “The brittle leaking pen of memory”. I wonder if the band has ever been so enigmatic. The riffs chug, the sticks dance across the ride cymbal. The strings bend. The song takes on a winding and snake-like motif, writhing beneath the repetitious chanting of “Siberian Thaw!”. Until halfway through, instrumentation ceases to be. It dissipates to a single droning tone, before gradually building back up again via laid back patterns and sensationally melodic, addictive and (still) winding basslines.
With a snap, we’re back to the chugging and sliding main motif, peppered with slamming guitar punctuation and Sabbathian dirges. The band often places an epic prog song fairly centrally to an album’s set, and I always enjoy them, but Siberian Thaw feels genuinely like a stand-out among esteemed company.
Deep Rooted’s main guitar line delivers a riff-face in the listener, immediately. Its mid paced slide, chug, off-beat rhythm seems as specifically designed for face-ache as The Hardship Of The Scots did on Old Star. Yeah. THAT GOOD. And the vaguely outraged “The silent treatment of the forest” line properly makes me smirk; as though the lads are offended as much as in awe of the Nordic woodland wonderland that inspires them. A magnificent mid-paced grinder. Triple A.
The Dry Wells Of Hell kicks of Side B with a great NWOBHM riff that, unfortunately, inspires Fenriz to launch into a castrato wail again that is sadly, ill-advised. Step in, Culto, FFS. I worry that everyone’s telling Fenny it sounds good. I admire the intent more than the result. Otherwise, the song’s something of a barnstormer, with harmonising guitars and interesting re-shapes and re-timings of related riffs, which gives the song a coherent bed for flourishes to tuck themselves in on. I particularly enjoy the riff towards the end of the song that plays slightly in front of the beat, which pricks your ears up before the fade.
The oxymoronic So I Marched To The Sunken Empire follows. Perhaps the boys have been watching Pirates of the Caribbean for inspiration. The idea of them both in their jammies, doing an Eric and Ernie, nomming popcorn in front of the telly on a sleepover, is a beautiful thing. I really hope that happened. It’s a very musical interlude. Instrumental, led by a diaphanous keyboard motif and harmonising guitars – but not, in any way, disposable.
Its purpose seems to be to lull the listener into a false sense of security before the punked up Eat Eat Eat Your Pride blasts in with the paciest leading riff of the LP. It moves into a sliding and winding line that recalls the earlier stages of the album. And even drops out to clean and chorused guitars, elevating the weight of the song and changing the dynamics of it entirely before dropping back down to a sliding chug again. Which bludgeons your earholes in the best possible way.
Despite the disposable song title, the writing manages to wrangle one of the albums most memorable riffs and satisfying songs from its own progressive mire. Rockist histrionics a go-go. Complete with off-mic outtake at the end.
The now-traditional-riff-regurgitation of Eon 4 brings the really satisfying album to a close. Eon has appeared in a different incarnation on the last three LPs. Each time, we are greeted with a revisited and rewritten song, based on the riff that first appeared on the band’s Death Metal debut, Soulside Journey, in 1991. And when a riff’s as good as that, why not? It’s an ever-evolving self-referential motif that I love. Sort of an Easter Egg. A poke in the eye for those weary voices that spout about Darkthrone running out of ideas and recycling their work ad nauseam. Like everything else they do, the band tackles that criticism head-on and deliberately. Nothing is accidental. And, despite Fenny’s wails and a somewhat shameful fade, instead of a hung chord (which would feel more appropriate), the song ends the album on a high.
Pre-Historic Metal is a fantastic addition to a brilliant catalogue of Darkthrone albums. Will dyed-in-the-wool Cvltists still harp on about the band betraying their Blackest roots? Of course they will. Just like they’ll still be craving for the band to play live, despite them not having done so for thirty years. It must be even more tedious for the lads to hear than it is for us to read about. For some reason, progression and retro-innovation within their field is frowned upon by those who consider themselves hardcore.
To them I say: grow up. Wipe off your corpse-paint. If you were truly around back then, you’re in your 50s now, probably with a steady job and grandchildren. Give it a rest. It’s time you learned where timelessness comes from. The insatiable need to create and to be bold enough to do that without excuses. I fucking DARE you to find another band that chooses to do that as prolifically and inventively as Darkthrone. Leave your adolescence in the past and revel in the moment. Pre-Historic Metal is an absolute fucking BELTER. All hail Da Frönes! It’s a good ‘un. It would be a 10/10 if Fenriz STFU and let Culto do all the singing.
Darkthrone @ Peaceville Bandcamp
Darkthrone @ Peaceville Official
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DoomThrone rules, end of.
I haven't had much time to sit with it, but I did think a few of the songs were great, while a few were just collections of riffs thrown together...it does merit the album title for sure, but for me it's not hitting the way the last one did.