Nosce Teipsum (‘know yourself’) are an Ukraine-based band, formed five years ago and especially known from their collaboration on a split with Lycanthropy (singer Furious is in both bands, by the way, and bass player Führer used to be part of them for a brief period as well) and Lebensabend (also from Russia) (Svartgalgh, 2010). In early 2011 Nosce Teipsum came up with the very limited demo-tape Riders Of Human Death (via Metal Throne Productions), and August 2012 saw the release of the At The Heart Of Hell-album, released via Hell Division Productions. The latter now gets re-issued via Metallic Media (good job once again!), with the 2011-demo as bonus.
After a short baphometian intro (Entering Hell’s Gate), Nosce Ipsum’s full album At The Heart Of Hell brings fast and furious, little traditional Misanthropic Black Metal, which includes a colossal rhythm section (such a massive drum patterns I haven’t heard that much), ugly and wretched vocals (mostly screams, with a guttural throat from time to time, and occasionally some kind of mechanic spoken words), nasty, gargantuan decelerations, and both melodic and epic riffs. The bigger part goes on in that vein, but Nosce Teipsum go further once in a while by adding unique moments. Examples are the bizarre, hypnotic bass-intermezzo in Psychology Of Genocide, the instrumental Obscure Doom epic Thy Path To Eternal Eternity, or Death Block, a short intermezzo based on a German WW-speech with some noisy background sounds. Because of the buzzing production (sometimes it accompanies my melancholic memories to the Swedish Old School; listen to the omening riff in D9, for example), and some repetitive riffs strengthen this statement, the whole sounds little mechanical and droning-industrialised, yet without performing Drone / Ambient / Industrial whatsoever. 8,5/10
Riders Of Human Death, with all different tracks compared to the full album, is strongly comparable, yet with a sound that is little less decent. And if I’m not mistaken, this material was recorded with a drum computer, which might explain those industrialised (and I have to admit: sometimes truly irritating) percussion patterns. On this demo too the band makes use of sampling (artillery fire, falling bombs, speeches and an orgasmic woman) and additions like acoustic guitars (the first half of My Black Death, for example, is based on acoustic strings only). 8/10