Byelobog Productions March 8th, 2010

After a long prison sentence for the murder of Euronymous of Mayhem, Varg Vikernes is back with a new release.  This album is not much different from all of his other releases, and offers the same brand of dark, (largely) instrumental black metal.  This album had already a controversial beginning, with the name, "Belus"  being chosen over the original name, "The White God", which had some people going about white supremacy.  According to Varg himself, "The White God"  is merely a nickname for the pagan deity, Baldur, over whom the new album is about.  The album title was then changed to "Belus", to discourage any further anti-Varg/anti-Burzum sentiments that may be spouted by the media.  For Varg's own words about this, see this link:  http://www.burzum.org/eng/library/a_burzum_story12.shtml

As for the music itself, it does not differ much from previous Burzum releases, and provides the listener with the same repetitive black metal instrumentation that is indicative of Burzum.  This is not to say that the album is bad, it just is not innovative at all, and gives us nothing new.  Even though I would never give it the same high praise as I have other one-man black metal performances, such as Funeral Mist, "Belus" is still an album I enjoy listening to as background music while I'm working or typing emails.  I recommend the album for truly die-hard Burzum fans, with the mention not to expect anything new.

Miss Dark