MIDNIGHT • Satanic Royalty (10th Anniversary) • DoLP

Metal Blade

Context Filthy, belligerent and obnoxious, Midnight make music to start fights to. Since 2003, One-man-band, Athenar, has been churning out an ungodly racket, dropping countless demos, splits and EPs, and in 2022 he returns with Midnight's fifth full-length, Let There Be Witchery. Delivering more of what can be expected from his demented mind, it is a catchy mixture of black and speed metal and dirty punk rock, and it is relentlessly compulsive.

The profoundly sinister d-beat romp "Telepathic Nightmare" kicks things off unpleasantly, and from there he slams through the likes of riot-starter "Nocturnal Molestation", the Motörhead-esque "Let There Be Sodomy" and loping bruiser "More Torment." When asked if there's anything on this record he has never done before, he has a typically Athenar answer: "There's the tune 'Devil Virgin' which has the Mercyful Fate disco hi-hat beat. That's something different." Lyrically, the record is "unfiltered savage animalistic-ness", and the deeper the listener delves, the dirtier they get, which is just the way it should be.