Athos is a vicious one man black metal band who hails from Greece, a thriving stamping ground for some of the most intense, hissing white noise black metal known to man. Athos, in Hellenic lore, was one of the Gigantes who during the Clash of the Titans, threw a rock at Poseidon, but in missing, the rock fell to form Mount Athos in the Aegean sea. Rumour has it that a lot of Greeks do not actually know this ancient story, due to many years of Christian ruling - Athos are here to re-address this situation.
On to the music, prepare for your eardrums to be severely eroded – from the 2nd track onwards (after the obligatory opening intro) the album prepares a feast of scorching, venomous black metal similar to the likes of early Gorgoroth & fellow country mates Kawir. Although mainly mid-paced, there is more than one occurrence where the pedal is pushing fully to the metal, and when it does, you certainly know it. This album has that extra edge however, due to being a concept album about Gigantomachia; which for me personally, certainly draws more interest than the usual Satanism edge. There's also a track which covers the story of the 300 Spartans of which there was a lot of interest in recently due to the movie covering the same topic which was released earlier this year.
All in all, this is well worth checking out, so long as you're not put off by really lo-fi black metal which takes the enamel off your teeth from ten paces. Good stuff.
