Emperor

Live at Wacken Open Air 2006
$12.98
Of course, being an Emperor fan, I grabbed this straight away, hoping it would be better than the Emperial Live Ceremony DVD, which is great but short, with a cut between each song. I was disappointed.

The problem is the video direction. Firstly, it's mostly limited to either close-ups or extreme wide shots of the stage, very few medium shots, so you never really feel like you're with the band.

Second, the director obviously knows nothing about Emperor: poor Samoth gets only a couple of brief shots throughout the entire thing ('cause obviously no fan of the band would be interested in seeing a guy standing there playing guitar), whereas the guest keyboard player gets probably as many shots as Ihsahn. Not only is this obviously the wrong emphasis for any fan of the band, but the keyboardist is constantly preening and posing, and wearing a shirt I'm afraid I can only describe as "faggy" (I have nothing against gay people) - with all these close-ups, I began to suspect the keyboardist was the director's boyfriend! (As a musician he was fine, however, and indeed his high vocals were dead-on and brought out an aspect of the music usually limited to the recordings.)

Because the visual component of the DVD was so disappointing, I now really wish I had bought the CD instead, and that's my recommendation to you.

Apart from the problems mentioned above, it was good to hear one song from Prometheus (In the Wordless Chamber), but I really would have liked to hear more.

The one extra is an hour-long grab-bag of stuff, with no chapter headings or descriptions. There is one really good part, in amongst the shoddy amateur live footage and autograph signings, and that is Ihsahn and Samoth demonstrating riffs for a guitar magazine. With just the two guitars playing, you realise how much of the great music and musicianship has been lost in the mix of the full versions - there's some really great stuff here, and I'd seriously be interested in an album of stripped-back versions like you hear here.

Emperor: The Death of Kings: A Novel of Julius Caesar (The Emperor Series)
$16.00
This is grim stuff. One of the things that attracts me to Caesar is that his (extremely well documented) life reads like an adventure novel. A straightforward novelisation works well.
The "history" in this book is so laughably bad, so poorly linked to the reality, so flagrant with its driving of coaches and horses through the fabric of reality that its almost amusing.
Avoid this like the plague.

IX Equilibrium
$15.98
Brilliant production and great musicianship lead to the best album of Emperor's career. Plenty of fire still left in the tank on their 3rd full length and the band works in harmony to create a superb symphonic black metal record. The music is plenty technical and will give you numerous listens to fully hear everything presented in rich full bodied splendor. This is an essential purchase for any fan of extreme metal!

Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk
$15.98
This is black metal at its best, absolutley amazing, the production is a bit of a downer but the brilliant song writing is totally worth it. This is the Master Of Puppets of the black metal world. Fast paced, brutal, melodic and beautifully executed. I cannot chose a favourite song because they are all awesome. Every black metal fan must have this in their collection.