Edged Circle Productions announces October 22nd as the international release date for Phantom Fire‘s highly anticipated debut album, The Bust of Beelzebub, on CD and vinyl LP formats.
It was but May 2021 when a brand-new entity burst from Bergen, Norway, bearing the all-too-apropos moniker Phantom Fire. With members hailing from such bands as Gaahls Wyrd and Krakow, the duo surprisingly went a different route with their debut EP, Return of the Goat. Hard-rocking, hard-charging, reeking of rust and diesel, Phantom Fire proved they were their own band removed from any sort of lineal references. Better yet, perhaps, they were just getting started and already promised a debut full-length…
Before the dust of Return of the Goat even had a chance to clear, that debut album is finally here: The Bust of Beelzebub! Flexing the same chops and some new ones, Phantom Fire‘s first full-length salaciously spans pitch-black speed metal and moody epic metal alike, all of it in (evil) obeisance to timeless HEAVY METAL magick. At once decades old and years ahead of the game, The Bust of Beelzebub bears an ageless wisdom across its succinct seven-song/29-minute runtime, like Aura Noir jamming out on some Cirith Ungol covers or early Omen getting turned onto the Swedish Cranium, and vice versa – on and on, ad infinitum, excelsior! Nevertheless, some interesting twists crop up in the most unselfconscious ways, like the spattering of spiraling psychedelic guitar or solemn Viking-dirge acoustics, altogether making for a wild ride across the hinterlands of the frozen Norwegian tundra…all before it’s lit afire!
With stout and richly analog recording courtesy of Iver Sandøy (Enslaved) at Solslottet Studio in Bergen and deliciously warped cover art by Nifelheim’s Hellbutcher, Phantom Fire‘s The Bust of Beelzebub is an exceptionally unique take on the traditional. The band will be making their live debut at this year’s Beyond the Gates: Uprising festival in Bergen on August 6th.
First track premiere and preorder info to be revealed shortly. Aforementioned cover art and tracklisting are as follows:
Tracklisting for Phantom Fire’s The Bust of Beelzebub
1 Return Of The Goat [2:26]
2 Bust Of Beelzebub [2:21]
3 Sweet Jezebel [3:22]
4. Pihsrow [5:26]
5. Shut Eye [5:10]
6. Feed On Fire [4:26]
7. The Ninth Gate [5:46]
MORE INFO:
www.facebook.com/phantomfireofficial