Satyricon – The Shadowthrone

Picked this up new in shrink-wrap, and the discs are both completely scratched. Side C skips in two sections and there are pops throughout. The awful inner sleeves it comes with made this record dead on arrival.

Very mixed impressions from not the best reissue of one of the iconic albums in the history of Norwegian Black Metal. It should be said right away that the value judgment is motivated precisely by the level of the edition itself, both in a subjective coordinate system and a completely objective understanding of quality.

1. The Sound
From the point of view of technical values, everything is perfect here.
DR 12 with a peak value of DR 13 https://dr.loudness-war.info/album/view/189090.
By the way, there are no questions about remastering, the album demonstrates its strengths, the material itself is quite epic, raw guitars and drums sound very natural, the atmosphere is created by expressive and solemn keyboards. We can say that Shadowthrone "breathed deeply" or something else. Really, the sound is matched with the energy of this album. It was more than worthily in the original version, but now it definitely hasn't gotten worse, it just led to the modern industry standard.

2. The Design
This album was given a new life not only due to the new sound, but also due to the changed design. This is also an actual phenomenon of today,but it would be right for the band to leave the lyrics, as well as for some kind of parallel with the origins to be traced in the new design. The interview is ok, but the lyrics and its design are also the class of the edition. There is no doubt that the band has an archive of that period, but instead of some memorabilia, we just see photos of bushes at night and unintelligible collages, and in general a lot of paper is used, and the space on the sheets is mostly unused.

3. The Quality
The printing set is made at a high level, thick durable paper, a little lamination, good image contrast and sharpness level. The edition turned out to be heavy, it's nice to hold in hands. But the devil is in the details. Vinyls are packed in printing envelopes without protection, which causes friction during transportation and stains/scuffs appear on the surface of the records. Just imagine, you bought a packaged product, but in fact you received not "Mint" but at best "Very Good-". What prevented the Napalm Records from making the circulation 1-1,5 euros more expensive, but to protect the products from spoilage? When playing 180 gram audiophile vinyl (ha-ha!), it constantly makes noises and crackles. No one was offended when they received 140 grams of vinyl, but without cracking, you know? Because of this decision, the cost of product and the cost of its delivery increases, and you still won't get the proper pleasure when listening. Where is the quality control for the production of several thousand copies? But they invested in advertising!

As for the decision to release in DLP format. Probably, for the double vinyl edition, it was possible to do mastering at 45 rpm. In general, the DLP format is good for playback without loss of quality, but in this case there is a lot of free space on the vinyls, and a separate side D is allocated for a five-minute ambient track at the end. Perhaps it was worth placing the tracks more compactly and leaving the D side empty or left for engraving.
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As a summary, it's hard to say what went wrong and at what point: a cult album, a long-awaited reissue, high expectations and total disappointment. The ugly quality of the vinyl kills all the positive aspects of this release. Of course, it is not always worth believing the reviews on discogs, but I regret that I did not pay attention to the number of complaints about the reissues of DMT and Shadownthrone...

Have to say my copy actually sounds pretty damn good. Got it in 2021 at a local store. Just giving my two cents. I’m not a die hard fan of the band or album so it could be those type of owners of this record are more unhappy. Idk. For $30 I’m more than satisfied. I don’t have excessive clicks and pops on mine. Just normal faint stuff on quiet sections. I’ve never liked this type of material for cover jackets though I will say that.

Just got this. Sealed in mint condition. Clicks and pops throughout. I cleaned the records. Clicks and pops EXACTLY in the same places! This is manufacturing issue with dirty stampers. Emabarrassing.

Sound is good, pressing is not so good. No problems with sleeve or inner sleeves which are nice, but the vinyl looks like master plates were dirty as lots of little marks that are pressed into the vinyl. Same problem with Dark Medieval Times. I give this pressing a B-

The album sounds great if you have a decent setup. I mean this and DMT are both very necro sounding records by satyricon standards. Also Satyr said they purposely tried to keep it as close to the original as possible. I like the new artwork and the album itself sounds great, Don't be swayed by a bunch of hating posers who claim to be fans of the band, think for yourself like an individual not a puppet, If you are a real fan of the band and have enjoyed the original album you will love this release.

excellent quality sound, no scratchers very clean sounding, great reissue.

Great sound, but the vinyl is shitty quality with a lot of sand and clicks. And the quality of cover is the level of toilet paper. A shameful reissue. All additional materials, interviews and photos had to be placed on a separate booklet, and the vinyl was put in special antistatic envelopes so as not to spoil the vinyl. But everything was done through the ass. Everything is made up wrong. Napalm you fucked up. You could have made a real masterpiece with such great remaster sound, but you fucked up. The goal of Napalm in this is to make money, but not to make a good reissue. I hope that the next reissue will be made by professionals, not merchants.