Listen: The Auteur Arc of Arcturus’ Arcturian

For the former member of a big band, it’s probably easy to be wracked with doubt about your post-big band albums. On one hand, sure, you’ve got a built-in audience — that’s nice. But what about the reputation that precedes you and your new/reactivated band’s jams? On its basis, most listeners have already cast their vote on you — for or against — and might not see the value in returning to the polls. They loved/hated/ignored your old band, end of story, so reeling them in on a second attempt requires a big move. And what about new fans, ones who arrived after your era in that big band and who stick to their own generation? Sigh, you get a panic attack just thinking along these lines.

So it’s admirable for any creator like former Dimmu Borgir bassist ICS Vortex to successfully ignore all that and proceed to crank out Arcturian, a masterpiece of soulful, joyous, spacey extreme metal by his band Arcturus. And it’s admirable of MetalSucks to warn listeners thrice to not overlook it, cuz holy shit it’s awesome, though no one could blame you (see above) for having blown by it upon your first couple encounters. Sniffed at our wonderful visit with Vortex on the MetalSucks podcast? Dismissed Arcturian‘s capsule in the new releases round-up Shit That Comes Out Today? No problem — here we are again with one more tip for you and a full album stream to bust your totally logical indifference. Crank it up!!!

Arcturus’ long-awaited new album Arcturian came out a couple Tuesdays ago via Prophecy. Get it here.