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1[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/this_world_contains_neither_meaning_nor_justice.jpg]]
2 [[caption-width-right:350:''"Walking over the precipice in communion is easier than to acknowledge yourself as the cripple you truly are."'']]
3
4--> ''"This world contains neither meaning nor justice!"''
5
6''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KzXgA7dxXI The Furnaces of Palingenesia]]'' is the seventh studio album by French avant-garde BlackMetal band Music/DeathspellOmega, and the band's 14th release overall. Like all Deathspell Omega albums since ''Si monumentum requires, circumspice'', it is a ConceptAlbum. However, it is lyrically a major departure from the band's previous releases. Trading in the dense theological poetry of their earlier work, the album instead presents itself as a tract from a secret political faction calling itself "The Order". Over the course of the album, the narrator unfurls a vision of a terrifying {{dystopia}}n world in which the Order holds absolute dominance over all aspects of life, culminating in the implied destruction of civilization.
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8Musically, the album also represents something of a departure from their previous work, having been recorded live in a studio on analogue gear, and with somewhat [[LoudnessWar more dynamic mastering]]. The band indicated in an interview after the release of the album that this shift in approach is a consequence of their shift in subject matter. They even considered performing it before live audiences, but the schedules of some of their members prohibited it - quite a surprise from an AnonymousBand.
9
10The album proved controversial on its release, sparking fierce debate as to how sincere its lyrics were. Some reviewers saw it as a satire of fascism and totalitarianism, noting the self-aware irony throughout the lyrics, as well as the narrator's attitude as a CardCarryingVillain. Others saw it as an outright NSBM album, noting the extensive connections assumed vocalist Mikko Aspa has with far-right politics. Ultimately, the band clarified their intentions in an [[http://www.bardomethodology.com/articles/2019/06/23/deathspell-omega-interview/ interview with Bardo Methodology]], confirming their stance as firmly anti-authoritarian and noting their political disagreements with Aspa, who evidently had no hand in the writing of the album.[[note]]The band has still not explicitly confirmed any details of its membership, but the Bardo Methodology interview is widely interpreted to be implicit acknowledgement of Aspa's participation in the band, since they allude to the controversy surrounding it.[[/note]]
11
12Track listing:
13# Neither Meaning Nor Justice (2:16)
14# The Fires of Frustration (4:59)
15# Ad Arma! Ad Arma! (4:09)
16# Splinters from Your Mother's Spine (3:12)
17# Imitatio Dei (4:56)
18# 1523 (3:37)
19# Sacrificial Theopathy (2:37)
20# Standing on the Work of Slaves (3:23)
21# Renegade Ashes (5:23)
22# Absolutist Regeneration (5:27)
23# You Cannot Even Find the Ruins... (5:19)
24
25!!You cannot even find the tropes...:
26* AlbumIntroTrack: "Neither Meaning Nor Justice".
27* AllForNothing: "You Cannot Even Find the Ruins..." would seem to refute the narrator's earlier claim of creating "an Order so perfect as to last a thousand years and then forevermore", showing that after the inevitable collapse of this society, there will not even be ruins left over to indicate it ever existed.
28* AnarchyIsChaos: Inverted; the record deconstructs totalitarian systems to show how chaotic they are for the masses of people who suffer under them:
29--> "We shall leave sufficient doubt about the Laws - or change them on a whim - so as to breed superstition, therefore turning adults into insecure, foolish children, stuttering panicked words of flattery and idolatry in a vain bid to tip the scales. We shall make sure that the smallest of your dreams is guaranteed to turn into a nightmare so that your thoughts never wander from the here and now. Today we protect, tomorrow we abandon you.\
30\
31Behold the fatal process of human civilization, and let’s raise a glass as the hour of redemption has come."
32* ApocalypseHow: "You Cannot Even Find the Ruins" could be anywhere from Class 3 to Class 6-whatever it was, it was so destructive that all traces of human civilization are completely gone.
33* AxCrazy: For all the narrator's insistence on creating order, he is ''utterly'' unhinged. He goes above and beyond even the practices of other totalitarian dictators, inflicting the most horrific acts of cruelty imaginable on citizens, including but not limited to: indoctrinating children and forcing them to wear pieces of their mothers' spines around their necks, force-feeding spiders to dissenters and feeding their hearts to dogs, [[BuriedAlive burying people alive]] for trying to help the poor, and of course, pulling a TakingYouWithMe on ''all humanity'' when the Order finally collapses.
34* BigBrotherIsWatching: Described as an essential aspect of the Order.
35--> "Loneliness is a feeling we will relieve you from; from the barren shores of the north to the heart of the empire, thou shalt always feel the scrutiny of the Eyes."
36* BlackAndWhiteInsanity: The Order preaches their own absolute infallibility and, conversely, the irredeemable evil of everything else. There is no room for compromise in their worldview; nonbelievers are to be killed without mercy, and their bodies desecrated.
37--> "The hand dispensing salvific murder is absolved of responsibility for it is the expression of a common will, the sacrosanct will of the Just. The Just, those righteous few that rose from the catacombs, view the world in manichean terms: there is only the purity of love and the purity of hate, that which lies in between is a mud made of the ashes of yesterday’s humanity and the fetid fluids of compromise."
38* {{Brainwashed}}: Taken to a ''terrifying'' extent on ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia''. From "Imitatio Dei":
39--> "We shall make you so impervious to the world that should all the Angels descend upon you and prove you wrong, you would simply shut your eyes and stop your ears, for they would not deserve to be either seen or heard. Our teachings shall shield you from the world and turn you into an island in dead waters with high cliffs and no coves."
40* BreatherEpisode: "1523" is considerably softer and more melodic than the rest of the album.
41* CapitalismIsBad: A theme of ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia''. (The album isn't any more complimentary to authoritarian communism, though; see TakeThat and TheRevolutionWillNotBeCivilized below.) From "Absolutist Regeneration":
42--> "Those who nourish the famished shall be left to starve. Those who heal the wounded shall be maimed. Those who console the lamenting souls shall be buried alive, their stomachs filled with ignominious larvae. Rats shall feed on the eyes of those guilty of empathy towards their fellow men. That which is not our credo is not to be."
43* CardCarryingVillain: If you take him at his word, the narrator of ''Furnaces'' is the most on-the-nose fascist of all time, openly admitting that his promises of utopia are lies and he views his followers as pathetic and expendable.
44* ConceptAlbum: A much more straightforward example than usual for this band.
45* CrapsackWorld: The world under the Order is a totalitarian nightmare.
46* CruelAndUnusualDeath: Another common practice that the Order likes to inflict on its citizens. See the quotes under DisproportionateRetribution and CapitalismIsBad.
47* DayOfTheJackboot: ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' as a whole is about this. It's explicitly referred to in "Renegade Ashes".
48--> "We shall march and march and the sound of our boots on the asphalt shall fill our hearts and minds entirely. It is only within the collective body that you are whole, outside of it you are incomplete and maimed. Walking over the precipice in communion is easier than to acknowledge yourself as the cripple that you truly are."
49* DeconstructiveParody: ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' is one of totalitarianism and politics more generally, suggesting that humanity's innate flaws doom all systems of rulership to corruption and chaos. The lyrics are spoken from the perspective of a would-be dictator and illustrate the vacuity of his concepts of freedom, truth, and power, which he even shows some signs of self-awareness about, but he ultimately doesn't care (e.g., "When confronted with facts that would contradict our credo, we shall speak out even louder, invoke our Order with brazen words and march forward with the arrogance of the doubtless"). This was the subject of some disagreement among the band's fans and detractors, but was explicitly confirmed as their intention in the Bardo interview.
50* DeliberatelyMonochrome: The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-sNygFHM9M video]] for "Ad arma! Ad arma!", though the final scene has some splashes of blood.
51* DisproportionateRetribution: Being a totalitarian faction, this is an essential practice for the Order.
52-->"The mouth of the dissenter shall be filled with spiders and his heart cut out and fed to the dogs"
53* {{Doublethink}}: ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' is ''suffused'' with this to the point of self-awareness, which is one of the problems a literal interpretation of the album faces. Indeed, this trope is pretty much {{invoked}}, which has led several reviewers to compare it to the TropeNamer. One of many examples, from "Standing on the Work of Slaves":
54--> "It is our immaculate faith that shall allow us to exercise coercion effectively but also to resist coercion when confronted by the impious. When confronted with facts that would contradict our credo, we shall speak out even louder, invoke our Order with brazen words and march forward with the arrogance of the doubtless.\
55\
56You will be made to deny the dissonance and conflict that is at the heart of the experience of our World. You shall join the chorus of praise that flows from the absolute perfection we have created by the sole power of our will. We shall bleed you white, but you will think that it is an act of unconditional love."
57** Another particularly memorable one, even displayed prominently in the LP packaging, comes from "The Fires of Frustration":
58--> "We will grant you freedom from freedom."
59* DownerEnding: "You Cannot Even Find the Ruins..." ends with the implication that the Order will take what's left of humanity with it when it eventually collapses.
60* DystopiaJustifiesTheMeans: The Order dispenses with even the pretense of creating a utopia, instead openly admitting that their society will be an authoritarian nightmare whose only real ideological principle is absolute power.
61* TheEmpire: The Order explicitly seeks to dominate the planet, as like all fascist movements it requires constant expansion and conquest to sustain itself.
62* EnemyToAllLivingThings: The Order's mission is explicitly anti-life, both human and otherwise; choice quotes include "Thou shalt scar the earth with barren furrows" and "Those who heal the wounded shall be maimed." The final track implies that they eventually even destroy themselves.
63* EpicRocking: Either {{Subverted}} or DoubleSubverted depending upon one's stances. This is the band's first full-length album since their debut not to contain a single track surpassing six minutes in length, but a lot of the album's tracks can perhaps be considered movements of a longer piece, since it's frequently difficult to tell where they even begin and end. In particular, the first three songs on side two ("Sacrificial Theopathy" through "Renegade Ashes") could be considered three movements of an eleven and a half-minute epic.
64* EverybodyDiesEnding: The album seemingly ends with humanity (and perhaps all life on the planet) extinct. It's implied that this may have actually been the goal of the Order all along.
65* EveryoneHasStandards: ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' is a textbook example. The band had spent most of its career advocating for a philosophy of evil, but ''Furnaces'', particularly when taken in conjunction with the Bardo Methodology interview, suggests that the rise of authoritarianism in recent years has been ''too evil'' for the band's standards. This may also be a real-life case of a HeelFaceTurn.
66* EvilIsHammy: The narrator uses extremely grandiose imagery to illustrate his worldview.
67* FadingIntoTheNextSong: The only clear gaps on the album are before and after "Absolutist Regeneration".
68* ForTheEvulz: The narrator is fully aware that the Order's stated goals are self-contradictory and impossible to achieve; he knows that the Order's only real purpose is the exercise of power for its own sake, and revels in it.
69* FullCircleRevolution: A theme of ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'', as the band explains in the Bardo interview:
70--> "The word palingenesia has multiple meanings, the biblical one being ‘Last Judgement’. The title of the record is therefore also an allusion to the fact that every rebirth, every revolution, already contains its own Last Judgement from the very beginning. That judgement is, as anyone who’s watched the video to “Ad Arma! Ad Arma!” knows: ‘Thou shalt scar the earth with barren furrows.’ A revolution starts with the incredible recklessness and optimism of youth, with an overload of energy – almost kinetic in nature – that may shatter the old world but, eventually, if history is any guide, will also devour its own children. It goes without saying that the judgement on our current world has already been uttered; it takes a lot of Valium to not hear the cracks, everywhere."
71* GenreShift: Not musically, but lyrically. ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' steps away from the dark theological poetry that defined the band's past records for something more akin to a straightforward political manifesto from a society that would make [[Literature/NineteenEightyFour the Party]] shiver in horror. To further the point, every song excepting the final track is written out in [[SpokenWordInMusic prose]].
72* AGodAmI: "Imitatio Dei" makes clear that the Order explicitly seeks to replace God in the minds of its followers.
73--> "The key to our doctrine shall be given only in the heavenly futures, those that lie beyond the boiling shores of struggle. Simple words shall be uttered, then placed in the midst of a tortuous maze, and rendered full of mystery. The System is born, the System provides answers. You shall renounce to sincere understanding so as to gain absolute certainty. You will stand unmoved by the pleas of reason, knowing that within the heart lies the conscience of the Order."
74* GratuitousGreek: "Standing on the Work of Slaves" uses the phrase "kléos áphthiton" ("κλέος ἄφθιτον"), which means "immortal glory" (helpfully translated by the band immediately beforehand). This is a recurring phrase throughout the works of Creator/{{Homer}}, especially ''Literature/TheIliad'', which the band also references in the same stanza. Strangely, the same phrase also appears in Sanskrit works (as "श्रवो अक्षितम्", "śrávo ákṣitam"), suggesting an origin in Proto-Indo-European.
75* GratuitousLatin: "Imitatio Dei" means "[[AGodAmI Imitation of God]]", and "Ad arma! Ad arma!" means "To Arms! To Arms!"
76* GreenAesop: A central theme of the album; the album argues that authoritarianism is fundamentally a death cult that will lead to the destruction of human civilisation (especially when combined with {{capitalism|IsBad}}). The band also argues that humanism - at least in the sense of placing of human concerns above those of the natural environment - is fundamentally destructive, ironically enough, to not just the natural environment but, ultimately, to [[InYourNatureToDestroyYourselves humanity itself]], reflected in a warped quote from Creator/JeanJacquesRousseau in the first song: "Everything is degenerate as it leaves the hands of the Author of nature; everything becomes good in the hands of Man." This is discussed further on the [[Music/DeathspellOmega band's page here]] and in the Bardo Methodology Interview.
77* GreenEyedMonster: The Order exploits the enviousness and insecurity of its followers to make them into loyal servants.
78--> "Hear our voices, all of you men of resentment! You whose stomachs and souls are aflame with the poisonous hatred of impotence, you who have been wronged again and again, wiping your face clean, day after day, from the spit of those sitting unjustifiably above you; we will grant you freedom from freedom."
79* {{Homage}}: It contains several passages reminiscent of Music/VedBuensEnde, a Norwegian band who were arguably the UrExample of dissonant black metal (and particularly the more avant-garde strains thereof).
80* HumansAreTheRealMonsters: A clearer example than anything else in the band's catalogue. It makes clear that there is no greater force for evil than human forces of power, even in the absence of both [[GodAndSatanAreBothJerks God and Satan]].
81* InferioritySuperiorityComplex: ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' portrays this as a necessary component of the fascist mindset, showing how fascists must cover for their failures and insecurities by viewing themselves as inherently superior beings who are unjustly repressed by masses of corrupt subhumans, and how their leaders turn this sense of resentment into fanatical devotion to the state and genocidal hatred for all else.
82--> "We shall base our ladder of dignity on things that are innate, things that require no skill nor exceptional aptitudes, so as to rally the masses of the inept and the interchangeables."
83* InYourNatureToDestroyYourselves: A central theme to all of Deathspell Omega's work, arguably, and certainly a central theme of ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'', seeing as its very title is based on the band's thesis that every violent revolution contains the seeds of its own destruction. The album ends with the Order (and, depending upon the listener's interpretation, ''all of human civilisation'') destroyed so thoroughly that no traces of it are left. The band remarks in the Bardo Methodology interview, "It goes without saying that the judgement on our current world has already been uttered; it takes a lot of Valium to not hear the cracks, everywhere." They also argue that humanity's destruction of the natural environment will result in the undoing of human civilisation, as seen in the GreenAesop quote on the band's page here.
84* IronicEcho: The Order proclaims that their empire will last a thousand years. In "You Cannot Even Find The Ruins", the world is described as being in "stale muffled silence for a thousand years".
85* KillThePoor: And anyone who helps them.
86* LiveAlbum: A variant; it was evidently recorded live in the studio.
87* LookOnMyWorksYeMightyAndDespair: Deathspell seem to think that Creator/PercyByssheShelley was a bit of an optimist.
88--> "You cannot even find the ruins\
89of the jewels of yesterday\
90they’re ashes gone\
91memories wiped clean\
92\
93You cannot find any jewels\
94among the ruins of today\
95everything’s stale\
96muffled silence\
97for a thousand years"
98* LoudnessWar: A less extreme case than most of the band's discography, coming in at [=DR7=]. Still a bit clipped and muddy, but not nearly as severe on this count as their last several releases. The album was recorded and mixed live on analogue gear, reflecting a new production approach, though the master still appears to have used digital technology.
99* MillionMookMarch: Parodied in the "Ad Arma" video. We see legions of identical human figures marching in lockstep, but they're walking directly into a guillotine.
100* MoodWhiplash: "1523" is quite subdued by the album's standards, and the transitions into and out of it are fairly abrupt.
101* MouthOfSauron: The Bardo interview implies that the narrator isn't the actual leader of the Order, but something more akin to this, and furthermore that the Order doesn't actually ''have'' a single leader. This is quite similar to how in ''1984'', Big Brother is very likely not a real human being, but a simple figurehead for the Party.
102* ANaziByAnyOtherName: The Order are directly based on the Nazi Party, as well as numerous, more obscure fascist movements elsewhere. The narrator also gestures towards Mao Zedong at one point, and the Bardo interview mentions the Khmer Rouge as another reference point.
103* NewEraSpeech: ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' amounts to a long, loquacious, [[StealthParody evidently self-aware]] one from a would-be authoritarian dictator.
104* NoNameGiven: We don't know the narrator's name. Probably intentional - we never learn anything about [[Literature/NineteenEightyFour Big Brother]], either.
105* NotSoDifferentRemark: The narrator explicitly notes this about the Order's enemies. From "Sacrificial Theopathy":
106--> "Thou shalt not feel confused when our enemies begin to resemble us, mirroring us, mimicking us, for by doing so they are marching to the beat of the Lost, toward the pits of History."
107* OmnicidalManiac: The Order's end goal is the extermination of all life on the planet — including itself – along with any traces left of civilization.
108* OrderVersusChaos: Subverted; the Order is ''incredibly'' chaotic for the citizens under its rule. One of many examples of {{Doublethink}} on the album, and possibly an oblique ShoutOut to ''Literature/NineteenEightyFour'', given the Party's paradoxical slogans of "War Is Peace. Freedom Is Slavery. Ignorance Is Strength."
109* PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: The narrator calls diversity an "outrage". After all, he is ANaziByAnyOtherName.
110* ThePowerOfHate: The Order uses this to motivate their footsoldiers.
111* ProtestSong: Surprisingly, a major lyrical theme on ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia''. The primary topic being protested is authoritarianism, but the lyrics are pretty unsparing in their criticism of many aspects of modern society. This was explicitly confirmed as intentional in the Bardo interview.
112* PurpleProse: Even by the band's standards, the language here is quite grandiloquent. This time it is also written in prose (except for the final track). Probably deliberate, for reasons mentioned above under EvilIsHammy.
113* PuttingOnTheReich: The Order is meant to be a sort of apotheosis for every totalitarian movement throughout history, but their most direct inspiration is the Nazi Party. Hence, they use a lot of Nazi-esque imagery and rhetoric throughout the album. "Absolutist Regeneration" refers to "a power that will purify the world, born to last a thousand years", an obvious reference to Hitler's vision for a "thousand year reich", while the video for "Ad Arma! Ad Arma!" contains references to Nazi iconography, such as architecture reminiscent of Albert Speer's plans for a post-war Berlin, a MillionMookMarch that hearkens to ''Triumph of the Will'', and lightning bolts shaped like the sieg rune raining down from the sky and impaling people. The band is explicitly condemning this, as confirmed in the Bardo interview.
114* TheRevolutionWillNotBeCivilized: The Cultural Revolution certainly wasn't, anyway. From "Ad arma! Ad arma!", utilising an almost verbatim quote from UsefulNotes/MaoZedong:
115--> "Nothing from the world of yore deserves to be preserved, every particle is infected and corrupt. The great cleansing shall take as long as necessary, for power exclusively stems from the gun barrel: on a glorious dawn, the odour of tear gas shall replace the scent of fresh-brewed coffee, the dust of crumbling buildings shall darken the horizon and fill your lungs as the sun reaches the zenith, victorious chants will resonate at dusk to the rhythm of cracking necks and the gunfire of mass executions. Behold the glorious beauty of unrestrained, fraternal compassion and love!"
116** The album as a whole is a condemnation of violent revolution, discussed above under InYourNatureToDestroyYourselves and FullCircleRevolution. It should be noted that the band says nothing either on the album or in their interviews to condemn peaceful revolutions, but their stance that humanity is an intrinsically violent species suggests that they are sceptical that such a thing will occur.
117* RoyalWe: Used throughout the album by the narrator, who is speaking on behalf of the Order.
118* SdrawkcabName: "We shall bear a world so perfect that its realization will undo us, we shall name it NEDE." [[spoiler:[[DontExplainTheJoke "Eden" backwards]]. Indeed, the world is a desolate wasteland at the end of the album.]]
119* SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: A Deathspell Omega trademark, still in full force here.
120* ShoutOut: Or possibly a TakeThat, if not even both at once: In the CutSong "Year ∞" (which is still included in the printed lyrics because Deathspell Omega regards them as crucial), the unnamed narrator says:
121---> “Finally, we shall make room for men of action, the dams of entropy, the bearers of the Law; they shall provide infinite supply of opiates to the souls of the restless masses and a sweet lullaby.”
122** This paraphrases a commonly misinterpreted and {{Quote Mine}}d Creator/KarlMarx quote about religion from his 1844 introduction to ''Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right''. In its (rarely seen) context, it reads:
123---> "The foundation of irreligious criticism is: ''Man makes religion'', religion does not make man. Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself again. But ''man'' is no abstract being squatting outside the world. Man is ''the world of man'' – state, society. This state and this society produce religion, which is an ''inverted consciousness of the world'', because they are an ''inverted world''. Religion is the general theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular form, its spiritual ''point d’honneur'', its enthusiasm, its moral sanction, its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and justification. It is the ''fantastic realization'' of the human essence since the ''human essence'' has not acquired any true reality. The struggle against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle ''against that world'' whose spiritual ''aroma'' is religion.\
124\
125''Religious'' suffering is, at one and the same time, the ''expression'' of real suffering and a ''protest'' against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is '''the ''opium'' of the people'''.[[note]]Often translated as "the opiate of the masses".[[/note]]\
126\
127The abolition of religion as the ''illusory'' happiness of the people is the demand for their ''real'' happiness. To call on them to give up their illusions about their condition is to call on them to ''give up a condition that requires illusions''. The criticism of religion is, therefore, ''in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears'' of which religion is the ''halo''." (italics as per original translation; bold added)
128** In Marx's day, opium was effectively the best painkiller available to the injured and sick, and while people were aware it could be addictive (and, more to the point, could give its users fantastic visions), they didn't really have any better options. In other words, Marx's argument is that religion is comforting, but it also fosters what his coauthor Friedrich Engels later dubbed [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_consciousness false consciousness]], wherein a subordinate class willingly embodies the ideology of the ruling class. In context, this fits precisely the role embodied by the "men of action" Deathspell Omega is discussing. More broadly, although Deathspell Omega have their philosophical disagreements with Marxism, ''Furnaces'' contains a similar critique of how ruling powers promise glory and fulfilment in the afterlife to convince the oppressed to align with their oppressors.
129* The album contains ''numerous'' references to authoritarian systems, both real and fictional. To list only a few:
130** As noted on this page, the constant allusions to {{Doublethink}} are highly reminiscient of Literature/NineteenEightyFour.
131** ''Renegade Ashes'' contains this line:
132--> 'The traitors ought to be punished but even those who are indifferent ought to be punished, you have to punish whoever is passive and dares not take sides.'
133** This is likely a reference to this infamous quote from [[UsefulNotes/NationalReorganizationProcess Iberico St Jean]]:
134--> 'First we will kill all the subversives; then we will kill all their collaborators; then their sympathisers; then those who remained indifferent; and finally, we'll kill the undecided.'
135* SiameseTwinSongs: If you weren't looking at your media player, you'd be hard pressed to tell where many of the songs begin and end. "Neither Meaning Nor Justice" into "The Fires of Frustration" and "Sacrificial Theopathy" into "Standing on the Work of Slaves" into "Renegade Ashes" are particularly subtle transitions, and the only thing making "Imitatio Dei" into "1523" any less subtle is the shift in song style. The last few track divisions are the only occurrences of silence on the album apart from the necessary side division after "1523", the latter of which only occurs on the LP version.
136* SinisterSurveillance: Extensively used by the Order. See the quote under BigBrotherIsWatching for one such example.
137* SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism: Does this one even have to be explained? It should be noted, however, that this album may perhaps be read as a textbook demonstration of a Creator/GeorgeCarlin quote, "Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist." This album essentially serves as a catalogue of how the band's ideals have been violated again and again throughout human history, and therefore of why they possess no hope that we will ever do better.
138* SlidingScaleOfLibertarianismAndAuthoritarianism: The Order is, of course, a fascist dystopia. The band's sympathies, as confirmed in the Bardo Methodology interview, can be plausibly read as anarchist, though they don't actually use the word to describe themselves: having expressed doubt that government or violence can ever lead to justice, there is essentially [[UsefulNotes/{{Anarchism}} only one place to go]], even if they also doubt that we can ever actually get there.
139* TheSocialDarwinist: The Order not only refuse to aid the poor, they punish any citizen who tries, as seen in the quote under CapitalismIsBad.
140* SopranoAndGravel: Most of the lyrics are screamed (seemingly by at least two vocalists at once), but "Renegade Ashes" has some clean singing.
141* SpiritualSuccessor: Lyrically it's very much a new frontier for the band, but structurally it has quite a few similarities to ''Paracletus'', most notably by having melodic intro, interlude, and outro tracks that break up the album.
142* StealthParody: ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' would seem to be a completely straight example. When it was released, fans and detractors were divided as to whether the band was condemning or espousing fascism, to the point where the Bardo Methodology interview seems to have been conducted in no small part to dispel such arguments.
143* StrawNihilist: The very first line in the album is "This world contains neither meaning nor justice!" The album goes on to show that despite their pretensions of bringing law and stability to the world, the Order believe in nothing besides satisfying their own desires.
144* SurprisinglyGentleSong: "1523" and "You Cannot Even Find the Ruins..." are arguably downplayed cases, being less harsh than the surrounding material; the vocalist even downplays (without completely eliminating) the harshness of the band's usual vocals, instead employing almost a sort of croaked whisper.
145* SurrealMusicVideo: The video for "Ad Arma! Ad Arma!" mostly consists of very abstract, vaguely fascistic imagery.
146* TakeThat: The entire album is one to fascism. The video for "Ad Arma! Ad Arma!" particularly mocks the conception of a "master race", as the human figures in the video, rather than being the sort of empowered ''ubermenschen'' that most fascists see themselves as, are instead shown as a legion of faceless, wretched beings willingly lining up for their deaths.
147** The same song also seemingly mocks UsefulNotes/MaoZedong's maxim that "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun" by deconstructing the horrors of his regime. Under this reading, later on the album, "Absolutist Regeneration" also mocks the "thousand-year empire" that the Nazis aimed to set up. The band explicitly intended these as condemnations, as confirmed in the Bardo interview, which is itself full of {{Take That}}!s (and is all the more powerful for it).
148** Another possible one in "Absolutist Regeneration" is "we will clean out the marsh at all costs". This is, we might note, very similar to a slogan strongly associated with the forty-fifth president of the United States, "Drain the swamp". Given the number of paraphrased slogans of other demagogues found on the album, the similarity may well have been intentional. It should also be noted that the context in which Deathspell Omega uses the quote is ''significantly'' more sinister than the context in which it was used in American politics, where it was an ostensibly anti-corruption slogan referring to "the swamp" of UsefulNotes/WashingtonDC. The preceding line in "Absolutist Regeneration", on the other hand, is "We will turn this world into a cemetery rather than not regenerate it our own way." This could perhaps be read as the band's judgement on the actual policies of said president, though the band do not address American politics directly in the album or the Bardo Methodology interview.
149* TextlessAlbumCover: As is typical.
150* VillainProtagonist: ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' is narrated by a fascist dictator who borders on being an OmnicidalManiac. The band cited Jonathan Littell's ''The Kindly Ones'', a novel about an SS officer, as being influential for the development of the lyrics.
151* VillainSong: Like pretty much all the band's work. ''The Furnaces of Palingenesia'' is a particularly strange example by their standards, though, because whereas a lot of their previous examples came across as ''sincere'', this album is suffused with self-aware irony that suggests that the stances being depicted on the album are [[EveryoneHasStandards too depraved and cruel for the band's tastes]].
152* VocalTagTeam: Several vocal passages are overdubbed, and since this album was recorded live in the studio, it's more or less indisputable at this point that the band has more than one singer.
153* WarIsGlorious: This idea is mocked in "Standing on the Work of Slaves". They don't actually quite explicitly say that WarIsHell, but it's pretty close. In the process they also throw in a ShoutOut to Homer (more than one, actually).
154--> “You shall aim to resemble the heroic Achilles, at war under the walls of Troy: a godlike figure, possibly Death incarnate. To those begging for mercy at your knees, you shall answer with a blade through the throat, to the defeated you shall show no respect: their bodies will be desecrated. When you fall, we promise you remembrance, immortal glory: kléos áphthiton. After all, what wouldn’t men do, only to escape oblivion…”
155* WitchHunt: Apparently an essential aspect of the Order's philosophy.
156--> "Suspicion shall be your companion, for if you conceal blemishes, your comrades must certainly hide blemishes even more severe. Your glance shall always be on your brethren and you shall weigh their worth constantly; which one of them shall be found wanting today? Do not fear to denounce an innocent and have him sentenced, thou shalt only fear to be too lenient with a deviationist."
157
158----
159--> ''You cannot even find the ruins...''
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