Considering their numerous (and rather confusing) ties to Sweden's reigning black metal tyrants,
Marduk,
the Legion's debut album offers very few surprises. In fact,
Unseen to Creation sounds virtually identical to the albums that
Marduk had been capably churning out for a decade longer: a positively pulverizing, vicious, yet majestic style of black metal. Other than putting
the Legion's very existence into question (after all, what's the point of a side project that sounds just like the real deal), there's no denying the album's solid qualifications. Forged in the fiery furnace of Hell (well, Sweden's famed Abyss Studios in any case) with producer/demon-in-charge Tommy Tägtgren, blistering onslaughts like "Redeemer" and "Knee-Deep in Blood" are driven by infernal guitar harmonies and whirling, cyclone-like blastbeats of the early
Emperor variety. Orchestrated keyboard backdrops can be heard throughout, and the odd synthesizer interlude and acoustic guitar intro pop up here and there (see "Cosmopathic Deathvoid" and "On Swift Wings"), but the abnormally moderate-paced instrumental "Ascendancy" offers the only respite, however brief, from the album's uniform velocity. Melody, of course, is at a premium, but this very scarcity winds up contributing to
Unseen to Creation's -- and indeed much of black metal's -- challenging but rewarding nature. In the end, it's only
the Legion's near-complete lack of original ideas that docks some serious points from this album's rating. ~ Eduardo Rivadavia