''Ritual.'' is the debut album by Czech

black metal Black metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal music. Common traits include fast tempos, a shrieking vocal style, heavily distorted guitars played with tremolo picking, raw (lo-fi) recording, unconventional song structures, and an emp ...

band

Master's Hammer Master's Hammer are a black metal band from the Czech Republic. The band has remained active with several lineup changes between 1987 and 1995, with a reunion from 2009 to the present. It is considered one of the most representative groups of i ...

, initially released through independent label Monitor in 1991. It was later distributed elsewhere and re-released in CD format by

Osmose Productions Osmose Productions is a French independent record label created in 1991 by Hervé Herbaut, after he had spent three years running a small mail order company. They specialize mainly in death and black metal bands. Many of the groups who began w ...

in 1994; Osmose's version contains two bonus tracks. Many tracks of the album were re-recorded from their 1990 demo tape ''The Fall of Idol''. The track "Jáma pekel" would eventually be re-recorded for Master's Hammer's 2009 album ''

Mantras A mantra (Pali: ''manta'') or mantram (मन्त्रम्) is a sacred utterance, a numinous sound, a syllable, word or phonemes, or group of words in Sanskrit, Pali and other languages believed by practitioners to have religious, ma ...

''.

Music video A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device ...

s were made for the tracks "Černá svatozář" and "Géniové". The track "Útok" was dedicated to

Church of Satan The Church of Satan is a religious organization dedicated to the religion of LaVeyan Satanism as codified in '' The Satanic Bible''. The Church of Satan was established at the Black House in San Francisco, California, on Walpurgisnacht, A ...

founder Anton LaVey.

Covers

Polish

blackened death metal Blackened death metal (also known as black death metal) is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal that fuses elements of black metal and death metal. The genre emerged in early 1990s when black metal bands began incorporating elements of death me ...

band Behemoth covered "Jáma pekel" on their 2008 EP ''

Ezkaton ''Ezkaton'' is the sixth EP by Polish extreme metal band Behemoth. It was released in North America through Metal Blade Records on 11 November 2008, and in Europe through Regain Records on 20 November 2008. The EP features seven tracks, includin ...

''. Their version counted with a guest appearance by

Root In vascular plants, the roots are the organs of a plant that are modified to provide anchorage for the plant and take in water and nutrients into the plant body, which allows plants to grow taller and faster. They are most often below the su ...

vocalist Jiří "Big Boss" Valter.

Critical reception

The band once claimed that ''Ritual.'' sold over 25,000 copies in the Czech Republic alone. It is considered to be one of the major albums responsible for defining the early Czech black metal scene of the late 1980s/early to mid-1990s, alongside

's ''

Zjevení ''Zjevení'' (English title: "''Revelation''") is the debut album by Czech black metal band Root, released in December 1990 through now-defunct record label Zeras. It is noticeably the only full-length album by the band to feature songs with ly ...

'' (1990) and

Maniac Butcher Maniac (from Greek μανιακός, ''maniakos'') is a pejorative for an individual who experiences the mood known as mania. In common usage, it is also an insult for someone involved in reckless behavior. Maniac may also refer to: Film * '' ...

's ''Barbarians'' (1995). ''Rock Hard'' magazine featured ''Ritual.'' on their list "250 Black Metal Albums You Should Know".

Fenriz Gylve Fenris Nagell (born Leif Nagell; 28 November 1971), known professionally as Fenriz, is a Norwegian musician, part-time music journalist and online radio host (with the show "Radio Fenriz")

of the band Darkthrone called it "the first Norwegian black metal album, even though they are from Czechoslovakia".

Track listing

Personnel

* František "Franta" Štorm – vocals, guitars, photography, cover art * Tomáš "Necrocock" Kohout – guitars * Tomáš "Monster" Vendl – bass * Miroslav "Mirek" Valenta – drums * Honza "Silenthell" Přibyl –

timpani Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a membrane called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally ...

* Vlastimil "Vlasta" Voral – keyboards * Milan Fibiger – bass (on tracks 6, 7, 8 and 10) * Miloš "Dodo" Doležal – production

References

1991 debut albums Master's Hammer albums {{1990s-metal-album-stub