ROTTING CHRIST – Sanctus Diavolos Gatefold-LP (Black in Beer Vinyl)

Limited 200 Copies in Gatefold Cover.

I think it's fairly safe to say that Sanctus Diavolos is the culmination of Rotting Christ's sound. The modern generic "extreme metal" tag that Century Media threw around fits the album very well - mainly because I think one would be hard pressed to really place a genre on Rotting Christ's later years. Sure, it's black metal, but in the same way Behemoth's mid-era stuff was "blackened", i.e by proxy of past releases. There's shrieking vocals instead of growled, and tremolo riffs instead of thrash or death metal riffs, and melody and bombast instead of brutality and heaviness. But, in addition to the blackened qualities, Rotting Christ have perfectly augmented their gothic roots - the leads, while heavy, have a certain airiness and composition resembling Paradise Lost, Tiamat and of course Rotting Christ's earlier works.