With a guitarist formerly of Setherial and Impiety and now bass player for Gorgoroth, Italian black metal Xeper are now releasing their fourth album.

Stylistically, this is a mixed bag. On the one side, it’s got the air of a satanic ritual, while it’s also heavy, belligerent and infused with melodic thrash. It wasn’t surprising to read that Mayhem’s Blasphemer plays a part on this album. The creepy guitar line is that of Mayhem. But then it will burst forth and take off at breakneck speed. “Under the Will of Satan” starts off in desultory fashion. The satanic ritual is enacted in the form of the spoken word, before an explosion of fire mingles with the template contemptuous guitar line. The drum beats methodically as the vocalist utters and squawks his profanities, and the guitar takes us down a dingy path. This is “Riding the Spirit of Lilith”. It drives forward like a battering ram before opening out in grandiose fashion. This majestic piece is the core of the album. From majesty we go to dark power and violence. The hammering “Of Purity and Death” settles down into a forceful groove. The sound is clear, yet the vocals sound as if they were recorded in the 1990s. The haunting intensity and eerie mood rise as the drums continue to provide the energy. The thrashing riff of “The Snake that Brought the Flame” has a feel of The Haunted about it, while reminding us of the satanic core at the heart of this. So too the title track, which closes this album, mixes thrashing fury with black metal atmosphere, and an impressively ominous soundscape to take us out.

There’s nothing new about this album really and I found it slightly disjointed musically but I did appreciate that “Ad Numen Satanae” is a maelstrom of intensity, atmospheric and true to its black theme.

(7/10 Andrew Doherty)

https://www.facebook.com/xeperofficial

https://soulsellerrecords.bandcamp.com/album/ad-numen-satanae