Hate – Bellum Regiis: The Crimson Majesty of War Made Flesh

Hate
Bellum Regiis
Metal Blade, May 2, 2025

It’s one of the great injustices of European extreme metal: Hate, the long-running Polish death metal machine, are not the household name they deserve to be. While their countrymen in Behemoth scaled the Olympus of international acclaim and Vader earned stripes as elder statesmen of sonic extremity, Hate have stalked the fringes—respected, yes, and beloved by the faithful, but never lionised like their peers. And that’s absurd. Because since the mid-’90s, Hate have churned out album after album of refined, pitch-black precision. They are consistency incarnate. But Bellum Regiis, their thirteenth studio effort, suggests they are not just consistent—they are essential.

This is a band that has stared into the abyss long enough to start sketching blueprints. Led by the ever-uncompromising ATF Sinner, Bellum Regiis is Hate at their most human, their most existentially tormented, and—perhaps paradoxically—their most majestic. It’s an album obsessed with power: what we do to gain it, what it costs to hold it, and what it does to the soul once it’s been attained. But this isn’t the cartoonish, horn-throwing power fantasy of sword-wielding heavy metal—this is classical tragedy, modernised and amplified. It’s the Iliad reinterpreted through blastbeats and dissonance, the crown of Agamemnon suspended on a mic stand, dripping blood and reverb.

From the title alone—Bellum Regiis (“A War of Kings”)—you know you’re in for more than just mosh fodder. The stakes are metaphysical. The lyrics wrestle with ancient dilemmas, dressed in modern skin. These are anthems of corrosion, where glory becomes ash and every act of dominance is haunted by regret. You can practically hear the ghosts of empires being consulted in the studio, their moans woven into the mix.

And what a mix it is. David Castillo’s production is an act of architectural brutality—clean without being antiseptic, punishing without becoming a digital smear. You don’t just hear this album, you stand in front of it, like it’s a granite monument with flame jets roaring from the flanks.

Sonically, this is death metal that breathes with intent. Sure, it’s brutal But that’s table stakes. What Hate deliver here is a deeper, more orchestrated form of devastation—an arsenal of melodic motifs, blackened textures, and rhythmic decisions that feel ritualistic. Tracks shift from savage to sorrowful without warning, like a knife fight that turns into a funeral.

Take “Iphigenia.” It’s not just a song, it’s a lament dressed in war paint. The riffs rise and fall like tragic scenes, echoing the Greek myth from which it draws inspiration. And this is where Bellum Regiis truly separates itself—it doesn’t just perform death metal, it dramatizes it. There’s narrative in the phrasing, emotion in the tremolo. It’s as if every note has something it’s dying to confess.

Or “The Vanguard,” a firestorm of precision drumming and melodic death architecture, which somehow manages to convey both brute force and mournful awe. It’s about conquest, sure, but also about the hollowness of conquest. You march forward, you kill the enemy, you win the war—and then what? You inherit rubble. The song surges like an army down a blood-slick hill, but the guitars whisper doubts all the way down.

Even when the album slows—momentarily, fleetingly—it doesn’t let go. Interlude “Rite of Triglav” introduces female vocals and spoken word, breaking the narrative open like a side door into the underworld. It’s an act of psychological spelunking, as if the band needed to retreat into the cave of the mind before mounting the final charge.

And that charge? Blistering. The album’s back half detonates with “Perun Rising” and “Prophet of Arkhen,” the former a blackened whirlwind that teeters towards Immortal territory if not for Sinner’s gristled growl keeping it tethered to Earth, the latter a muscular, Slayer-tinged fusillade that proves Hate know their thrash history but aren’t interested in tribute acts. These aren’t genre exercises; these are declarations. It’s as if each song is an essay on power, delivered via battering ram.

“Ageless Harp of Devilry” closes things with the subtlety of a vengeful god—no fade-outs, no ambient wanderings, just one last cannonade of tremolo-picked apocalypse. It’s glorious. It’s exhausting. It’s Hate, planting their flag in a wasteland of their own making.

So—does it work?

Hell yes, it works.

Bellum Regiis doesn’t just succeed—it thrives. It’s not reinventing the wheel, but it’s reforging it in hellfire and inlaid obsidian. There’s a deliberate and masterful command of tempo, tonality, and emotion here that places Hate not just in the realm of proficient death metal acts, but among the vital few still pushing at the genre’s philosophical limits. In an age where so many metal records feel like gym workouts set to guitar, Bellum Regiis is a treatise. It’s thoughtful, it’s literary, and it’s ferocious.

In the pantheon of modern European death metal, this album stands as a cathedral. It's far from the sun-drenched slaughter of Florida’s classic wave—it’s frostbitten, melancholic, severe. But where some albums in this vein collapse under their own intellectual weight, Bellum Regiis moves with confidence. It’s doom-laden, yes, but never dreary. There’s a heartbeat under the corpse paint, and it’s furious.

Hate may never be the loudest name in death metal’s ever-roiling discourse. But with Bellum Regiis, they’ve made a case—not for trendiness, not for nostalgia—but for legacy.

And legacies, like kings, are forged in war.

🔥 Score: 8/10
💀 Essential Tracks: Bellum Regiis, Iphigenia, The Vanguard, Prophet of Arkhen
📻 File Under: Melodic brutality, Death-scarred philosophy, Symphonic war metal