When this CD fell on my doormat I was very pleased since Enthral’s predecessor The Mirrors Opposite End left a good impression on me. After a quick glance at the artwork and the biography I could not but wonder why it looked all so familiar. Well, it turned out that Subterranean Movement was already part of my CD collection. Not a good sign, if I couldn’t even remember owning the album. Not a good sign at all.

Subterranean Movement follows in the footsteps of Satyricon and Thorns and fails miserably. Enthral has tried to retain their old sound and imbue it with an icy cold touch but have ended up with the worst of both worlds. This is the single most boring black metal album I have heard in the past few years. All the songs drag on and on and if you are looking for a mind numbing experience I can highly advice this album to you. Sure, there’s a lot of diversity within each song but it all somehow blurs into a mess of guitars and terrible drums. On top of that, Enthral has tried to create the same atmosphere as Thorns by using machinery samples in their music but to no avail. The same can be said about the icy cold production that tries to recreate the atmosphere of for instance Satyricon’s Volcano.

Well, it is icy cold but it is not like the clinically coldness of Satyricon or Thorns. No, it is messy cold and especially the drums suffer while the guitars sound lackluster.

It took me about 15 minutes before my mind woke up and discovered a relatively interesting song, the title track. Finally Enthral deliver a song that features great riffing and doesn’t degrade into an endless cycle of boredom. The second track worth mentioning is the last one, “Charge Of The I” where Enthral show yet again that they are capable of writing some very original sounding riffs. Unfortunately, two songs don’t make an album.

If you have never heard of Enthral and thus don’t really know what to expect, I can tell you that they play highly technical old school black metal that at times even flirts with technical death metal. The band used to feature ex Dimmu Borgir keyboard player Stian Aarstad but he is no longer part of the band and it shows. I advice fans of The Mirrors Opposite End to steer clear from this release because it simply won’t live up to your expectations. Highly disappointing is all I can say.