Craft - Total Soul Rape (2000)

It’s a fuckin inscrutability to me as to how this fantastic album went completely unnoticed by both me and largely the entire black metal fan base back in 2000. Craft’s, ‘Total Soul Rape’ from 2000 was a criminally overlooked release, which has thankfully been reissued no less than two times (Selbstmord in 2002/Moribund 2004) since its initial release.

Craft’s history roughly dates back to 1994 where the band was formed under the moniker of Nocta, although not much happened until 1999 when they released a demo called, ‘Total Eclipse.’ It really wasn’t until 2002’s, ‘Terror Propaganda’ album that Craft finally attained some attention and rightly so, but this debut release has always been my favorite.

If you haven’t heard Craft then let me say they specialize in a form of grim misanthropic black metal easily compared to Darkthrone's masterwork, 'A Blaze in the Northern Sky' and other sonic purveyors of black metal truness. A number of the riffs are reminiscent of that era of Darkthrone's, which of course was largely Celtic Frost influenced for those guys back then. As you may know those sorts of riffs are just goddamn catchy grooving/rocking riffs, which lead to plenty of headbanging and so on, and even the few solos spread out through this record are fantastic too. Of course plenty of the classic dissonant, mid-paced and grim black metal riffs are present too, but the mix between the two styles works perfectly in my opinion.

Other notable aspects are the merciless vocals and drumming. Session vocalist Björn screams, howls, and rasps just as good as someone like Nocturno Culto or Satyr, and he even occasionally adds this high pitched shriek that sounds gravely painful. The drumming is also quite admirable forsaking the usual sloppiness found in this type of black metal for a much more rigid technical style.

Surely the whole album is first-rate, but the standouts are, ‘World of Plague,’ ‘Death to Planet Earth,’ ‘Past, Present Dead,’ and the somewhat more calm, ‘Total Soul Rape.’ Each song is oozing with evilness, malice, misanthropy, great riffs, harsh vocals, and simply all the elements that make black metal the supreme form of extreme music.

Total Soul Rape from start to finish is a complete mind fuck of black metal wickedness and grim hate filled feelings that you’re utterly required to hear especially if you're a fan of the older black metal from the 80's/early 90's.