Kreator – Phantom Antichrist – 2012

Phantom Antichrist is the 13th studio album by Kreator. I find it less aggressive and more melodic than the previous Hordes of Chaos. Is that a good thing? Yes, in this case I think it is. Here, Kreator shows a more dynamic approach than ever before. There are even acoustic guitars in there, at least it sounds acoustic to me. Let me be clear, it’s not anymore a power ballad or anything like that. It’s just a single intro, but nevertheless, it has more flexible structure than ever before.

It took me a while to get into it. It doesn’t have as recognizable songs as Enemy of God or the relentless aggression of Hordes of Chaos. But after giving it a few spins I finally got into it. Keep in mind that Enemy of God has been played at least a hundred times and I know all the songs by heart. I might have given Phantom Antichrist five or six playthroughs before writing this text.

But I like it. As I said, it’s something in between the previous two albums and the concept is very close to those albums too. All tracks written by vocalist/guitarist Mille Petrozza, Jürgen Reil does some great drumming, Chrisian Giesler is on bass and Sami Yli-Sirniö continues handling the lead guitar.