Alright, I'll explain why now. Maybe it's because it was the first real black metal album I heard but for me I just love the atmosphere I get from it. Even from the two Darkthrone albums after my brain doesn't set a similar setting that A Blaze gives me. Every time I listen to it I get an image of various satanic rituals happening in an extremely cold and frosty temperatures. Plus I love the various death metal like riffs but in a frosty black metal necro style.
Why not? It is probably the most compositionally complex of the bunch. Obviously composition, themes, and melodies are more relative, but I find them to be on par (honestly, with the exception of HLTO, above) the other albums mentioned.
The production is up for critique, but in the same way that the odd production of Transylvanian Hunger helps achieve a certain aesthetic, so does the production on Anthems.
I don't feel compositional complexity should be a factor at all. When I listen to BM (or any genre of music really), I don't listen for complexity, I listen for the atmosphere and feel created by the music... as I said, Emperor is great... the first two kick untold amounts of ass. But they just do not live up to the images in my mind that albums like HLTO, Filosofem, Transilvanian Hunger, De Mysteriis, etc, can create.
Why the fuck did you sig the cat? Ugh. Adblock, come here baby. What? Yeah, this fag.
Black metal sucks.
Deathcore 4 life.
ITNE is a masterpiece. My fav BM album.
Anthems also kicks ass though is not as good as Nightside.
IX also kicks ass. And yes I consider it black metal. Not as good as the first two but still a great cd.
Prometheus is where Emperor begin to lose me... more of a prog metal album than a black metal album and too complex and pretentious for its own good. Still it has some gems on it.
Dictius Te Necare is good and if you disagree, you're an idiot.