Thought this forum could benefit from a Bethlehem thread. Only familiar with 'Dark Metal' myself, a wonderfully moody piece of music, I'll certainly be checking out their other releases. Is it all vaguely in the same vein? It's just the 2009 release doesn't seem to have been warmly greeted.

Also, not sure how valid the "Bethlehem invented Dark Metal" argument is as the album in question is undeniably doom metal with the odd black metal touch. Then again people's descriptions of what dark metal is are usually as useful as a Nun's vibrator.

The 2009 release is SUIZID rerecorded with Kvarfoth on vocals and is utterly SHIT.

Sitck to the first three releases they are more or less in the same vein but all feature different vocalists.

The third SUIZID has Marco Kehren of Deinonychus doing the vocals.

But my favourite of the three is still album nr. 2 Dictius Te Necare which has finally a vinyl release in 2009 which is rematsered and sounds much better.

ABout the rerecording of SUIZID... originally Marquis of Ataraxie did alll the vocals for that but at the last moment Bethlehem decided to rerecord it with Kvarfoth because he is a bigger name.
Shame on them... cause as some recvent split singles with Bethlehem songs off SUIZID where Jo/Marquis does the vocals show he is much better suited for those songs.

But the good news is that Jo/Marquis has joined Bethlehem and is recording new songs with them now. So hopefully that means a return to the old sopund of the first three albums.

Only album what I like from band is Dark Metal, also Dictius Te Necare, never understand albums what came after those, and never will,

The debut album is fantastic, Dictius Te Necare and Suizid are also great albums. Every album of these three is unique. Alexander Welt is weird and I can´t listen the 2cd version till the end. Mein Weg is quite enjoyable, very melodic and completely different from first three great albums. A Sacrificial Offering... is absolutely useless, I don't understand why they did it...

At the moment I've only heard Dark Metal and SUIZID but both of them were incredible releases. Anyone looking for doomy black metal should check these out. Pretty underrated band for some reason.

Written by Marcel Hubregtse on 25.04.2010 at 03:12

The 2009 release is SUIZID rerecorded with Kvarfoth on vocals and is utterly SHIT.

I know, its awful. I think in general the vocals in German just sound so much better and fitting.

Wow...it really is bad. I'm a fan of Kvarforth's vocals and I really enjoy both Shining and Bethlehem, but that....that was just really really bad.

Written by Got Mayhem? on 16.05.2010 at 18:34

Wow...it really is bad. I'm a fan of Kvarforth's vocals and I really enjoy both Shining and Bethlehem, but that....that was just really really bad.

Same applies to me.

I said God-damn: Dark Metal really has to be one of the greatest doom albums ever conceived. Not since Epicus Doomicus Metallicus have I heard such a perfect collection of doom riffs.

It really is a magnificent album. I'm at a loss as to why this band receives such little attention, especially when they have put out albums of such extremely high quality. They put the majority of the huge wave of modern Depressive BM bands to shame.