Thorns Vs Emperor - Thorns Vs Emperor - CD

CLASSIC 1999 RELEASE FEATURING 2 NORWEGIAN BLACK METAL LEGENDS – INCLUDES RARE BONUS TRACKS

Originally formed in 1989 by mastermind Snorre Ruch, Marius Vold & Bård Faust (Emperor), Norwegian band Thorns has inspired a great number of acts such as Satyricon, Mayhem, Dissection & Emperor, mainly due to Snorre’s highly influential style of playing & creating riffs on the early Thorns demo tapes. So impressed was Euronymous of Mayhem, that Snorre became second guitarist in the band for a while & his riffs were used in classic Mayhem tracks.

‘Thorns Vs Emperor’ was originally released in 1999 & was the first official output from Snorre, besides the early cult Thorns demo material & rehearsal recordings. It had previously been discussed with Samoth of metal titans’ ‘Emperor’ that the 2 bands could release something together as a collaboration & later Satyr of ‘Satyricon’ became involved to make the project happen, also lending his vocals to the ‘Thorns’ tracks on offer here.

The ‘Thorns’ part of this disc features reworked & re-recorded versions of the aforementioned demo tracks, which had been swarming the underground for years. The songs were given a new, clean & powerful lease of life with the razor sharp & chilling riffs. New samples & effects were also added to further the dark & strange atmosphere, lending a slight industrial texture to some parts.

Emperor shows their wizardry with classical, industrial & electronic renditions of their own & Thorns, material; a highlight of which is a stellar metallic cover of the Thorns black metal classic, ‘Ærie Descent’. This was from a time when Emperor was highly active & one of the leading forces in the metal world.

This edition of ‘Thorns Vs Emperor’ includes 3 bonus tracks. The first song is a rare version of Thorns’ ‘You That Mingle May’ with Satyr & Fenriz of Darkthrone on vocals. Also included are 2 pre-production versions of the Thorns songs ‘Ærie Descent’ & ‘The Discipline of Earth’.