The second album from Finland's Beherit is a far better effort than the terrible The Oath Of Black Blood. Nowhere near being even decent musicians, Beherit concentrated on creating a dark and blasphemous atmosphere and unlike the debut, it works. The main reason why this desired effect works this time around is due to the fact that Beherit slowed things down considerably, allowing the suffocatingly bleak atmosphere to breathe through the songs, at times reaching into pure Black Ambient territory as in "Nuclear Girl", "Lord Of Shadows And Goldenwood" and the extremely dark yet strangely tranquil "Summerlands". There are still a few fast compositions in the vein of the debut, but they benefit greatly from a much better production (even though the sound is still quite dreadful, its aeons better than the debut) and a clearer vision of where to take the song itself.

The vocals of Vengeance NuclearHolocaust are some of the most inhuman and utterly demonic I've ever heard. Even though they are drowned in effects for much of the album, his vocals are just plain sick and achieve the demonic effect much better this time around, where his voice has room to breath through the slower, more atmospheric appraoch. Truly one of the most bone chilling and downright frieghtning vocal performances ever to be recorded.

This is easily one of the most dark and disturbing listening experiences one can encounter, and at this time Beherit had a very mystical aura about themselves. Very rarely did they give interviews and when they did they never really said much, nor was it easy to find photos of the band anywhere. This was the way Black Metal should have remained, mystical, misanthropic, and obscure. Drawing Down The Moon is a journey through the blackest corridors of the soul, a voyage into the coldest void where the light of a way out is far beyond the realm of nonexsitence...

This review is credited to:
palewake