I remember hearing In The Nightside Eclipse in my freshman year of college. It truly was beyond my comprehension at the time and while it grew on me, it was Anthems To The Welkin At Dusk that was the moment of my tr00 conversion to black-metal fanaticism. Still, the band’s debut album always held some sense of mysticism: the raw production, legendary album art and airy allure kept it almost at an unreachable level of appreciation. Until tonight, that is.
I was fortunate enough to see the band in 2006 (sans Samoth) in New York and then again in 2017 in Norway where they played all of my top-10-favorite album Anthems in its entirety. When the mini-tour in the spring of 2025 was announced, imagine my surprise that this small Maryland town would be privy to host the mighty Emperor’s presence. Tickets were secured without a moment of hesitation. The fact that Nightside would be celebrated on this night was merely icing on the proverbial cake.
Google took me straight through DC for my trip this evening and the stop lights aplenty were enough to diminish spirits. Arriving in time to catch a glimpse of Wolves In The Throne Room was fortunate, and I enjoyed their droning sounds as I waited in the lengthy merch line. A quick trip to the bar and the head, not in that order, led me to meeting up with Tim, Erin’s former colleague, whom I’ve seen almost annually, after last years Mother’s Day Wayfarer concert and At The Gates’ revisit of Slaughter Of The Soul in 2022. The conversation was heavy on AI and the inevitable demise of the future, but I respect his vantage point and his words I revisited in the coming days.
Unfortunately, such distracted banter and my less-than-two-week-old surgery meant that we didn’t get very close for tonight’s festivities. I was quite disappointed in that, but while my desires to be close are never far from my thoughts, being anywhere near was impractical. Far away I resided for the night, as evident by some of my photos.
The album’s intro began with members emerging one by one into view. Ihsahn arrived last, just as the opening blast beats began and Into The Infinity Of Thoughts issued forth, its memorable-yet-simple riff accompanying Trym’s consistent rhythm. Shoulder injury may have relegated me to the detached realms of the venue, but my enthusiasm was not affected by said distance. I was immediately immersed into one of the less-known but most-influential recordings in history. They sounded fucking fantastic. Almost unrealistically so. The draw of the original LP is its sound and production, but it’s not the most approachable. Tonight, I could hear it all: Secthdamon’s booming bass, appropriately-mixed keyboards, Trym’s clocklike perfection and the one-two punch of Samoth and Ihsahn – it was fucking perfect.
That this was all written as teenagers isn’t lost on me. The Burning Shadows Of Silence, Cosmic Keys To My Creations & Times – it’s all such nonsense. But it sounded simply incredible. With each subsequent song, my appreciation grew. Emperor has always been my favorite black-metal band and despite having seen them twice before, tonight cemented this forever, with Nightside magically moving up my favorite-albums-ever list despite being three decades old.
And thus, as the night continued on, I realized that black metal – now three decades old – is all grey. Neither Ihsahn nor I have yet to hit 50, but Samoth certainly has. Tim mentioned how he resembled Father Time. The band’s balance between the extreme and the melodic – few have done it as well as they did on this record and this evening’s performance sounded as good as I could’ve hoped.
The final two songs from Nightside are legendary in their own right and they were both, almost dismissively, just as expected: phenomenal. This alone would’ve constituted a perfect evening but of course, there was more. While other shows (Europe, mainly) had some early-era material, they instead moved along with newer songs: one of my least-favorite IX Equilibrium songs, the requisite Prometheus entry and four from Anthems. You can guess which from each appeared, but predictability does not diminish quality and as Ye Entrancemperium concluded, my enthusiasm was exhausted. I often revisit my introduction to this song way back in 1997. The moody vastness of Alsvartr leading into the mind-boggling speed of this track was indubitably my introduction to their claim: “Emperor plays Sophisticated Black Metal Art exclusively”. Holy shit, it exceeded even my lofty expectations.
The night’s outro, The Wanderer, felt apt. An epic finale to a journey decades in the making. Having seen them several times over numerous years and in different states and countries – the voyage from teenage angst to mature adult – it all felt both perpetual and fleeting. I’d certainly see the band again, but I couldn’t ask for anything more after such a tremendous night. Simply amazing.
Setlist
- Into the Infinity of Thoughts
- The Burning Shadows of Silence
- Cosmic Keys to My Creations & Times
- Towards the Pantheon
- The Majesty of the Nightsky
- I Am the Black Wizards
- Inno a Satana
- Tape: Opus a Satana
- Curse You All Men!
- Thus Spake the Nightspirit
- The Loss and Curse of Reverence
- With Strength I Burn
- In the Wordless Chamber
- Ye Entrancemperium
