Band:	Forgotten Tomb
Album:	Obscura Arcana Mortis
Style:	Black metal, Doom metal
Release date:	2000
A review by:	KwonVerge

01. Nightfrost
02. Nefarious Nights
03. Forgotten Tomb
04. Obscura Arcana Mortis
05. Outro

Forgotten Tomb is the band that Herr Morbid formed back in 1999 to express his misanthropic visions and emotions through obscure extreme music playing pure Norwegian Black Metal; the doom/black metal days were about to follow. The first mini-cd of Forgotten Tomb, "Obscura Arcana Mortis", was released during 2000 in a time when all the instruments and drum-programming were being performed by Herr Morbid and the whole outcome of the album shook the underground scene with its dark extreme sound. Night falls and macabre shadows start to dance as?

?"Nightfrost" embraces your dying body. Razorblade guitar riffing with the one great riff coming after the other overruns your spine with the imposing rhythm section lending groove to the song as Herr Morbid spits curses here and there howling from the core of his blackened soul singing lyrics of utter darkness, of of pain and of mystic sadness. The album continues in absolute greatness as "Nefarious Nights" cover the sky and your fearful soul as you wander into the obscure unknown. Another raging composition with Herr Morbid almost dying while singing living every single word he utters, whether he howls or at times chants in the vein of "De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas" as Attila used to chant in his renowned claustrophobic way, evoking an intense dark atmosphere as the razorblade guitar riffing and the raging drumming keep on burning the shrouds.

The album flows wonderfully as "Forgotten Tomb" starts to echo blackening the horizon opening with a rhythmic piece that slowly turns to another raging black metal storm. Depressive and misanthropic are the lyrics that Herr Morbid utters with this unearthly interpretation escalating the song whenever he screams "forgotten tomb" as the utterly inspired guitar riffing in combination with the imposing rhythm section surround him. It seems that the album consists of only great songs and the title-track, "Obscura Arcana Mortis" is definitely one of them. The raging rhythm of the razorblade guitar riffing along with the ecstatic howls of Herr Morbid take you to a place where Darkness reigns supreme and there's no turning back for shadows embrace you and "the wolves will lead us towards the place of nightmares." A dark ritual composition, "Outro", leads "Obscura Arcana Mortis" to its bitter end as Herr Morbid's eerie voice keeps you company in the utter darkness while left all alone in your misanthropic silence?

If you want to listen to pure Norwegian Black Metal with an intense occult misanthropic atmosphere then the only thing you have to do is to trust Herr Morbid's unearthly summoning in "Obscura Arcana Mortis".