Illogical Contraption: OBTAINED ENSLAVEMENT x3

Another winning recommendation from Brother Mike J (who also brought us Aeternus earlier this week), Obtained Enslavement make an excellent case for the use of silly shit like synthesizers and choir vocals in black metal, and, much like Aeternus, manage to keep a razor-sharp sense of menace and brutality throughout. Today I present their first three full-length albums, spanning from the years 1994 to 1998, as a testament to this band's unequivocal unfuckwithableness.
Let's see here, pertinent information...
1) Pest, pre-and-post-Gaahl vocalist for Gorgoroth, fronted Obtained Enslavement, and his tortured, vicious screams match (or surpass) anything Varg or Dictius-era Bethlehem ever did. He also had a knack for either laughing maniacally or shouting "Let's go!!!" in the middle of a song, which I can totally get behind. 2) Nicolas Trier AKA "Morrigan", who played keyboards for O.E., also played keyboards and bass in the previously-mentioned Aeternus. Norway is apparently a small country. 3) Through the course of these three albums, O.E. pronounce a distinct shift from super-raw and less symphonic earlier on to slightly-less-raw and more symphonic later on. All three albums are pretty amazing, though, and if you have any amount of appreciation for things like swords or castles or barbarians or summoning evil deities forth from cryptic dimensions, I can pretty much guarantee that you're going to love this band.

CENTURIES OF SORROW (1994)