Metalcatto
The people have spoken, and we started a new section, filled with hunger and ambition—but let’s see how it goes. Imperial Triumphant is the definition of a band of rich kids that went to art school. Nothing wrong with that, because I’m a huge fan! In fact, IT is New York’s response to French Avant-Garde/Black Metal hegemony, and as much as I love that scene (despite its controversies), who the fudge wants to be ruled by the French? Let’s start this countdown as a celebration of the upcoming release Goldstar.
5. Abominamentvm: Is this even an album? I always saw it as an EP—well, it turns out it is. I like to call it “the forgotten one” since I can’t quickly pronounce that name. The band was already showing promise, a je ne sais quoi that, though still rooted in traditional and atmospheric Black Metal, had something more festering beneath its surface. It’s raw, unpolished, and carries the stench of something primal, a clear homage to bands like Deathspell Omega or Dodecahedron. Yet, it dove into this Avant-Garde territory like many before, but few have navigated with such unsettling ease.
4. Spirit of Ecstasy: I’ll be honest with you—this is the album where I started to get a bit worried about the band. Yes, there is a delirious amount of jazz experimentation and grotesquely mesmerizing saxophone work, but I can’t shake the feeling that the band was slipping into a world of opulence and theatrical excess. It’s a worthy entry in its discography, but aside from the singles, its melodies slip from my grasp like smoke from a dying ember. IT remains in a league of its own, surpassing nearly all competitors, but at this stage, the battle is only with its own past. And now, we arrive at the true heavyweights.
3. Alphaville: All right, time to talk about love—as in, I love this album because it sounds like the perfect soundtrack for a ’50s nuclear Armageddon. Alphaville is grotesque, abrasive, and at times feels like a fever dream unraveling in real time. Yet, amidst the chaos, there’s an exquisite sense of narrative and retro-aesthetic grandeur, conjuring visions of Metropolis or the cold, mechanical determinism of Atlas Shrugged. This is where the band shed much of its Prog tendencies and fully embraced the jazz-inflected chaos, sculpting soundscapes that are both decayed and oddly elegant. There’s a reason why many hail it as a masterpiece—it was a radical shift in direction for IT, and it was nothing short of exhilarating.
2. Abyssal Gods: Choosing between this and the number one spot was almost impossible. With a title echoing Nietzsche’s Twilight of the Idols, this album drips with grandeur and violent beauty. It is ugly, profane, and drags Metal kicking and screaming into unexplored depths of horror. Few albums (perhaps only Ashenspire’s Hostile Architecture) have captured the suffocating dread of overpopulated, decaying cityscapes with such bone-rattling precision. This is a love letter to New York, but one written in bile and ash—a metropolis of filth and fractured dreams. And then there’s “Black Psychedelia”, a track with a guitar solo so searing it feels like it could peel the skin from your skull.
1. Vile Luxury: For many, this will come as no surprise. This is the album that truly elevated IT beyond being just another bizarre Black Metal band. Vile Luxury didn’t just push Metal forward—it shattered expectations and rebuilt them in gold and rot. This is the sound of champagne-soaked denial in the “Jewel of New York“, while, below, the desperate and discarded carve each other apart for scraps in the gutter. Vile Luxury was my gateway into IT, and few albums have left such an indelible mark since. The songwriting is untouchable, the vision unrelenting. Even in its abstraction, the album never loses its sense of purpose or thematic weight. To revel in luxury while the world crumbles at your feet, knowing you could change it but choosing not to—that is the true obscenity. Beyond its innovative sound, Vile Luxury is conceptually transgressive, and that is the very essence of great Metal.
That’s it! Fight each other in the comments like the poor do for mercy in New York. Are you ready for Goldstar? Don’t worry, you won’t have to wait long for our fancy opinion about it. Stay put!
Metal Eclipse Reviews 
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