{"id":302001,"date":"2026-02-25T20:57:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T20:57:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/302001\/"},"modified":"2026-02-25T20:57:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T20:57:10","slug":"the-magus-daemonosophia-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/302001\/","title":{"rendered":"The Magus – Daemonosophia Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Magus is the eponymous band of The Magus himself. At times known also as \u2018Morbid,\u2019 \u2018Magus Wampyr Daoloth,\u2019 or even \u2018George,\u2019 the entity known as \u2018The Magus\u2019 is somewhat of a fixture in the history of Greek black metal. He contributed mightily to the scene by performing on the first two Rotting Christ full-lengths, founding both Necromantia and Thou Art Lord, and owning and producing at Storm Studio in Athens, the recording location for many of Hellenic black\/death metal\u2019s seminal records. In 2021, it was announced that Necromantia had \u201cnow descended into the Abyss\u201d following the death of its co-founder, Baron Blood. Shortly after releasing that band\u2019s swan song, The Magus announced the birth of The Magus as a vessel to express his Luciferian worldview. Performing vocals, bass, and keyboards, the titular tyrant conscripted Necromantia drummer Maelstrom and Soulskinner guitarist El to carry out this vision, releasing\u2026*checks notes*\u2026\u0392\u03c5\u03c3\u03c3\u03bf\u03b4\u03bf\u03bc\u03ce\u03bd\u03c4\u03b1\u03c2, the band\u2019s ambitiously varied and theatrical debut, on Halloween of 2023. And now, The Magus has returned with follow-up Daemonosophia, promising to conjure \u201ca more aggressive and dynamic sound.\u201d<\/p>\n

That promise seems to have been delivered, as Daemonosophia arrives with nary a 9-minute track to be found. The two advance singles land as relatively straightforward black metal tunes but still manage to maintain The Magus\u2019 penchant for horrific theatricality. I was tempted to embed first proper track \u201cPsuedoprophetae,\u201d an absolutely blistering assault that appears on the heels of a version of the Lord\u2019s Prayer that\u2019s a bit different than the one I was taught in Sunday school, but I\u2019ve opted for \u201cMagia Obscura\u201d instead. The latter demonstrates more of the diversity found across Daemonosophia, its snarl augmented by a clean intro and majestic heavy metal guitar leads.<\/p>\n

Daemonosophia by THE MAGUS<\/a><\/p>\n

But don\u2019t let those two tracks trick you into thinking that Daemonosophia is just another melodic black metal album. The variety on offer within these compositions and their 47 minutes is astounding. The title track made me realize what Iced Earth in their prime might have sounded like if they were a black metal band, \u201cAmelia\u201d is a hauntingly beautiful tribute to the dramatic devilry of King Diamond, and \u201cThe Era of Lucifer Rising\u201d sees The Magus reworking a tremolo-laden black metal church-burner from Thou Art Lord\u2019s 1994 debut record into a melodic monstrosity of esoteric might. But perhaps the greatest surprise is album closer, \u201cLa Llorona Negra,\u201d an outstanding cover of a classic Latin American folk song. Organ, harpsichord, and piano introduce the song and its first, female, vocalist, and for a moment, it doesn\u2019t sound all that different than the version you heard on the Coco soundtrack. That is, until your hear La Llorona herself screaming in anguish behind the beautiful singing, and before the song evolves into a metal juggernaut with The Magus on the mic near the halfway point.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

There is very little for me to complain about on Daemonosophia. Its runtime feels vastly shorter than it is, and its compositional flow has made it nearly impossible not repeat over and over again. The Magus demonstrates an incredible gift for songwriting, Maelstrom\u2019s drumming is a tympanic tempest that lives up to his name, and while El might play for Soulskinner, he should probably be called \u2018Facemelter,\u2019 as his guitar playing has made it look like I touched the Ark of the Covenant. My one critique would be that the production feels a bit heavy on the low-end tones, and this was initially a barrier to me feeling Daemonosophia\u2019s full impact. The album is saturated with hidden touches that demand to be heard, and I had to minorly tweak my EQ settings to fully excavate them. At the end of the day, this is a small price to pay for an album that has delivered me multiple Song o\u2019 the Year contenders in \u201cThe Era of Lucifer Rising,\u201d \u201cAmelia,\u201d and \u201cLa Llorona Negra.\u201d<\/p>\n

In interviews, I\u2019ve seen The Magus boldly claim to make \u201cextraordinary music for extraordinary people.\u201d I\u2019d say he\u2019s half right. I\u2019m just an ordinary dude, but Daemonosophia\u2019s extraordinary music has spoken to me nonetheless. The last year or so has been a bit rough for me physically, and I\u2019m having to face the fact that I can no longer live life the way my pre-40s self could. So when \u201cThe Era of Lucifer Rising\u201d closes with (what I believe to be) \u2018Above hatred and madness\/Beyond weakness and pain\/I raise the veil and break the chains\/My reign has just begun\u2019, followed by a pair of powerful screams, I can\u2019t help but feel empowered to handle whatever challenges this new era brings me.<\/p>\n

Rating: 4.0\/5.0
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: The Circle Music<\/a>
Websites: necromantiathemagus.bandcamp.com<\/a> | facebook.com\/themagus666<\/a> | www.themagus666.com<\/a>
Releases Worldwide: February 20th, 2026<\/p>\n

\n\tGive in to Your Anger:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Magus is the eponymous band of The Magus himself. At times known also as \u2018Morbid,\u2019 \u2018Magus Wampyr…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":302002,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[2246,18328,842,165691,156,152203,44839,33748,149302,117051,157,165692,111,139,69,762,763,135376,34051,165693,165694],"class_list":["post-302001","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-2246","tag-4-0","tag-black-metal","tag-daemonosophia","tag-entertainment","tag-feb26","tag-greek-metal","tag-heavy-metal","tag-king-diamond","tag-melodic-black-metal","tag-music","tag-necromantia","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-review","tag-reviews","tag-rotting-christ","tag-the-circle-music","tag-the-magus","tag-thou-art-lord"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302001","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=302001"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/302001\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/302002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=302001"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=302001"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=302001"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}