Given Ancient’s reputation within the underground I had high expectations for this CD, and while it was not as good as I expected it was a (somewhat) worthy purchase nonetheless. The CD starts off with a boring ambient track and than progresses into part I of the ‘Cainian Chronicle’ - ‘The Curse’, this song is so bad I never even listened to it all the way through. The next songs of the chronicle redeem the entire CD ‘Lillith’s Embrace’ is clearly the best track on the disc and ‘the Disciples of Caine’ is also a nice track. As far as musicianship and song writing skills go Ancient is certainly nothing special… The guitars are boring, the bass is incredibly hard to hear, and the drums on this album are terrible… I could do better percussion on pots and pans! The vocals, on the other hand, are unique and very, very good. Kaiaphas has a *much* grimmer voice than most of the other Black Metal singers, and *finally* someone hired a professional female vocalist instead of letting their girlfriends sing in their band as most bands do… The female vocals are very good on this CD. I loved the vocals on this CD. The production ain’t bad either, a bit opaque, but it fits the music well… the vocals are pushed to the forefront and are about twice as loud as the guitars and drums are, which is a good thing. The lyrics on the ‘Cainian Chronicle’ are very nicely done too and tell the story of Caine, Abel, Lillith, Michael and the rest of the crew in a very eloquent fashion.

Pros: Unique (and excellent) vocals, good production, impressive lyrics
Cons: Poor Musicianship, bad packaging, slow tempo
Style of music: The tempo is mostly slow, with no blast-beats and little double bass, the focus of the music is definitely on the vocals, which are done well. The guitars are quite boring, except for the rare solo… I suppose you could call this style of music ‘Slow, Vocal-based, Dark Metal’.

Final Judgement: A nice CD. If you are into this kind of music then it’s worth your money. If you rarely listen to this style of black metal then your money would be better spent elsewhere.

Overall 7/10

© 2000 sauron anarazel