The Adversary is the debut studio album by Norwegian black metal musician Ihsahn. Released on 10 April 2006, it is the first in a conceptual trilogy of albums including angL and After. It features a guest vocal appearance by Ulver's Garm. The album has been noted for its stylistic diversity, encompassing extreme metal as well as progressive and classic metal influences.
In 2024, Loudwire elected it as one of the 11 best progressive metal debut albums.
The album combines various extreme metal genres with progressive and classic metal in the vein of Judas Priest. According to Matt Mills of Metal Hammer: "[Ihsahn] intentionally regressed to his earliest influences: NWOBHM licks, symphonic swells and black metal tremolo picking alongside his seething screams. From that foundation, he built all kinds of weird shit." Ihsahn himself described The Adversary as "all over the place, with me trying out other subgenres in metal that I didnâÂÂt really have a go at before." He further explained of the album's diversity that it had its origins in a certain nostalgia:
Ihsahn described his intention with the production as realizing "a more sparse sound picture, inspired by more '70s metal. I also mixed that album in an analog studio with equipment from the '50s, '60s and '70s and didn't overdub any guitars."
Several songs quote Friedrich Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra, which Ihsahn has cited this as a key influence "not just because of the philosophical themes, but also the beauty of the language, the whole kind of religious undertone in this very ungodly philosophy."
Additional musicians
Additional personnel