Enthroned returns after years of silence with “Ashspawn”: belgian black metal reborn

After six years of silence, the Belgian black metal institution Enthroned resurfaces with Ashspawn, an album that redefines their position among the genre’s enduring titans. Set for release on December 5, 2025, through Season of Mist, this record arrives as a ritual more than a collection of songs, an invocation built from years of introspection, decay, and resurrection.

Recorded at Ophiussa Studio in London and mastered at The Hive, Ashspawn carries the unmistakable fingerprints of Enthroned’s uncompromising vision. The lineup, featuring Nornagest on vocals and samplers, T. Kaos on guitars and bass, and Menthor on drums, channels both precision and fury in equal measure. From the first blast beats of “Crawling Temples” to the closing abyss of “Assertion,” the album embodies the essence of black metal stripped of pretense and soaked in transcendental menace.

Conceptually, Ashspawn is described by the band as both autopsy and rebirth, a descent into spiritual disintegration followed by ascension through occult transformation. The lyrical core revolves around demonology, metaphysics, and ritual esotericism, all framed within a sonic landscape where chaos and control coexist. Every track unfolds like a conjuration, alternating between dizzying speeds and oppressive mid-tempos, creating a balance between brutality and mysticism rarely achieved in modern extreme metal.

The first single, “Raviasamin,” serves as a key to the album’s ritual architecture. The accompanying video rejects artificial intelligence in favor of tangible artistry: every sculpture, robe, and carved figure was manually created before being reimagined inside Unreal Engine. The result is a digital rite-immersive, unsettling, and unmistakably Enthroned. The visual imagery, dominated by depictions of Belial and the qlippothic tree, amplifies the metaphysical depth that has long separated Enthroned from mere mortals in the scene.

With artwork by Jose Gabriel Alegria Sambogal, Ashspawn will be available on digital formats, CD digipak, and multiple vinyl editions, including limited gold and splatter variants designed for collectors who value both the sonic and visual dimensions of the craft.

For a band that emerged in the early 1990s and has survived every wave of black metal reinvention, Ashspawn is more than a return, it is a statement of permanence. Enthroned remains one of the few entities capable of transforming raw blasphemy into sacred art, reaffirming their role as architects of the abyss in a world that has grown too comfortable with imitation.