It is one of those albums that you have to listen to many, many times.
After first couple of times, it becomes good. But after numerous times, it becomes great, a masterpiece of music!
Even though the entire album is very brutal and hateful, every song is still different and unique and recognizable. It makes it impossible to even pick a personal favorite song on this album.
The lyrics are also excellent and very hateful and trippy. Some of the highlights when it comes to lyrics would be this:
This is all but falseness
You Have Nothing, You Are Nothing
I Shall Reveal Your Truth
I Am the Ghoul You Fear
I Am the Psychic Truth
I Was There When Satan Went!
or this:
I Close My Eyes to the World
Kiss My Skinless Corpus
Make Me Revel in Your Weak Souls
Make Me Feast on Your Nightmares!
or this:
Inside a Mind so Deranged
How I Wish You All Were Dead
Annoying Humanity Sickens Me
I Contemplate Your Extinction
The Beast I Caress You Never See
Everyday I Destroy Your Lives
Inside My Castlewalls Life Runs Red
In my opinion, Chimera is one of the best Mayhem albums. It's true darkness and blackness and misanthropy.
Yes, the more you listen to it the better it gets.
There a moments of such furious intensity and the riff layers are mind blowing. Soo Mussorgsky, riff upon riff, each bigger and darker.. amazing...
It is also in my opinion one of the greatest drumming performances i have ever heard, it is titanic, huge, its fucking brilliant!
For me this is the best Mayhem album by far, pure Mayhem. A masterpiece.