#BlackMetalMonday #blutausnord

https://youtu.be/F8-HswEND9M

#etherealhorizons

I'm waiting for my vinyl copy.

Strigiform – Aconite Review

By Samguineous Maximus

Sometimes, you catch a glint from deep within the festering promo heap and you know exactly what kind of beast you’re about to prod. Strigiform’s debut, Aconite, radiates the unmistakable stench of “I, Voidhanger-core”—that wonderfully cursed strain of aural decimation that critics slobber over while normal metalheads back away slowly, usually on smaller wierdo labels like I, Voidhanger or Transcending Obscurity. Think along the lines of AMG darlings from this year like Hexrot, Patristic and Ritual Ascension. Let’s check the boxes, just for safe measure. Genre tag reads “avant-garde black/death” (Check). Hails from Italy, where pretension and brilliance are often bedfellows (Check). Cover art looks like a philosophy major’s panic attack rendered in oil paint (Check). Pretentious song titles? “Knell of Nethermost Withdrawal” (Triple Check). This is the kind of swirling, self-immolating chaos that promises either transcendence or a migraine.

Luckily for Strigiform, their songcraft does anything but check boxes, and the compositions on Aconite are nuanced and powered by a crack team of impeccable musicians. This is a quartet of underground metal veterans, from bands such as Vertebra Atlantis, Afraid of Destiny and Thirst Prayer, showing every bit of their pedigree across a lean 34-minute runtime. They merge the reality-altering riffcraft of mid-period Blut Aus Nord, the crystalline cleans of Haunter’s lighter moments and the sly virtuosity of Serpent Column into something entirely their own. Guitarist Saprovore careens between satisfying second-wave tremolos, uncomfortable suspended arpeggios, and spacey, phaser-coated clean sections dripping with a subtle menace. This delectable guitar work is backed by a tasty, jazz-fueled bass performance by Aiokos, who anchors the 6-string haze with a warm, meaty backbone, guiding the ear through these twisted compositions with melodic fills and supporting the eldritch riffery when necessary. The instrumental trio is rounded out by Morte Rossa on drums, who blasts and gallops as expected during the more anarchic moments, but also brings a gentle rhythmic touch to the record’s softer motifs. Each performance is impressive in its own right, but it’s the synthesis of these talented players working together to create considered compositions that elevate Aconite to a higher plane of perverse consciousness.

On Aconite, songs unfold naturally, brimming with skronktastic chaos and understated melodies. Strigiform understands the necessary push and pull to accent a work’s heavier moments, spending almost as much time lulling you into a sense of hypnotic false security as they do pummeling your eardrums with unholy blackened fury. The more aggressive cuts (“Adamant,” “Obsecration”) are led by omnidimensional death-tinged riffs and octopus-armed drum grooves while vocalist N shrieks abstract void poetry atop it all, but the rest of the album leaves plenty of room for brooding atmosphere. “Scorched and Hostile” emerges from its aural onslaught and ends on a sickening off-time chordal refrain, while album highlight “Hypnagogic Allure” weaves around a gorgeously haunting, Imperial Triumphant-esque clean arpeggio, building towards a dissonant freak-out as its poignant conclusion. Aconite demonstrates a pointed and deliberate pacing that often eludes bands of this ilk. Whenever a section might overstay its welcome, Strigiform interject with a novel, mind-bending part which furthers the song, easing up on the gas when necessary, but always deepening the band’s twisted vision.

Musically, Aconite is superb, but the work as a whole is elevated by Strigiform’s keen sense of thematics. The six songs on Aconite are ordered from shortest to longest, with each piece becoming more and more expansive until the 8-minute finale “Knell of Nethermost Withdrawal,” a tune that begins with nearly two minutes of abstract noise before the band’s familiar groaning lurch explodes into action. A full album listen gives the sense of descending into the Conradian darkness of some sinister subterranea. This is aided by some truly standout lyrics which evoke a poetic nihilism with the flourish of French symbolists like Baudelaire or Rimbaud. Such evocative lines as “Encapsulation of screaming cells / Inebriated by rotten velvet / Heal me with your aconite hands / Soak me in crimson flames / Turn my wrath to limestone / Drown in smoke” or “Molten into iridescent hallucinations / of devoured perception / yet again, another moment of consciousness / coerced into contemplation.” set my inner English major’s heart ablaze and are clear evidence that Aconite has the narrative weight to match its outstanding musicianship.

With Aconite, Strigiform have crafted a fully realized artistic statement that pushes the boundaries of esoteric underground metal. It’s the kind of album that makes all the trials and tribulations of music reviewing worthwhile—a debut from an unknown band on a modest label that completely floors you. Aconite is dynamic, intricate, and richly layered, a record every fan of avant-garde metal should hear. I can’t wait to see what Strigiform do next

Rating: 4.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: I, Voidhanger Records
Websites: i-voidhangerrecords.bandcamp.com/album/aconite
Releases Worldwide: November 14th, 2025

#2025 #40 #aconite #afraidOfDestiny #avantGarde #blackMetal #blackenedDeathMetal #blutAusNord #deathMetal #experimentalMetal #haunter #i #iVoidhanger #imperialTriumphant #italianMetal #nov25 #review #reviews #serpentColumn #strigiform #thirstPrayer #vertebraAtlantis

Heutiger #Posteingang:
"Disharmonium - Undreamable Abysses"
Lovecraft'scher Space-Horror in Musik von Blut aus Nord

#BlutAusNord #music #blackmetal #psychedelic #avantgarde #metal #Lovecraft #spaceHorror #oldOnes #abyss #disharmonium

BLUT AUS NORD (França) presenta nou single: "The Ordeal" #BlutAusNord #AtmosphericBlackMetal #AvantGarde #BlackMetal #IndustrialMetal #DarkAmbient #Octubre2025 #França #NouSingle #Metall #Metal #MúsicaMetal #MetalMusic

Dysylumn – Abstraction Review

By Thus Spoke

There’s a distinctive quality about French black metal that hints at its creators’ origin—and I don’t mean the language the lyrics are written in. It’s a sort of warmth that soaks into the guitar sound, which can alternately feel like roaring flames, spooky ethereality, or quaint mellifluousness depending on its implementation. Given this, it’s almost surprising that no one has done what Dysylumn do, and coalesced these interpretations into one.1 The shadowy, southern-France duo have quietly garnered a loyal fanbase in the black metal underground with an atmospheric black metal that borrows as much from the dissonant and avant-garde as it does the trve and classically melodic sub-genres. After dropping an epic double LP in 2020’s Cosmogonie, Dysylumn’s return with the comparatively miniature Abstraction is seemingly to remind us that they’re still out there, in the darkness. But what does it portend?

Abstraction is deliberately and appropriately titled. Formed of five numbered eponymous tracks, its structure invites interpretation as multiple processes of some coherent whole. This is further borne out by the style of the music itself, which manifests as a sprawling, semi-dissonant form of atmospheric black metal akin to putting Blut Aus Nord through a Mare Cognitum filter. In a progressive and sempiternal manner peculiar to the genre, melodies reprise and fall away behind echoing shouts and wails—sometimes creating a sound reminiscent of a more abstract Abduction[2. the UK one]—and movements are marked more by variation on the central theme than by special transformation—with some notable exceptions (“III,” “IV”). Its reverb and fuzz-laden tremolo, graceful yet uncomfy rhythm swaps, and frequent, impassioned throat-singing may demand patience and tolerance to the uninitiated. But it doesn’t damn Abstraction to the indistinct void; it creates one of its own.

If there’s anything Dysylumn have nailed with Abstraction, it’s the aura of mystique. By harnessing both the other-worldliness of unusual melody and moaning harsh vocals, and the ethereality of a subtly poignant, spacious atmoblack, the duo create a space simultaneously warm and cold. It’s weird, but it kind of works. You might be shivering at a weird high guitar line (“I,” “II,” “V”) and drifting off to a surprisingly mellow one (“IV,” “V”), and at the same time. Dysylumn switch keys and tempos frequently, but in a way that’s natural, as they slip from wintry second-wave to an almost post-black hum of plucks and taps (“III,” “IV”)—all styled in a reverb-heavy, glittery veil that’s grimy and crystalline simultaneously. With impassioned screams punctuating the peaks of dreamy and intense melodies alike (“II,” “IV”). The greatest moments on Abstraction see the strange and the beautiful fully coalesce in sweeping, stringlike tremolo melodies (“III,” “V”) and dramatically escalating, blackened-doom-coded releases (“IV”), against which gurgling growls turn to throat-singing, and then full-bodied screams. It’s here that I’m fully invested in the world that Dysylumn are crafting.

Abstraction has the power to draw in its listener by being this magical combination of headily atmospheric and slightly alien. Yet it’s not until the midsection—”Abstraction”s “III” and”IV”—that this power really shows. While “I” and “II” arguably set the scene by launching immediately into frosty and floaty off-kilter scales, they are plagued by a songwriting structure that sees them endlessly iterate the same melodic patterns, switching back and forth between the same keys. This tendency reappears, though less egregiously, since the repeated key-change movement pass is forgivable when, for example, Dysylumn use it above a d-beat (“V”), and not another shuffle, or blastbeat as before. The transition, then, into the dreamlike cascades of doomier, more nuanced guitar, punctuated by affecting crashes, bellowing climaxes, and palpable urgency, that characterises the move to “III” and “IV” is stark. Dysylumn avoid discontinuity by maintaining the key threads of the hazy, half-dissonant theme that runs through the record. But the fact that the first third of a 36-minute record is its worst, and so hinders a listener’s chances of reaching the deeper, more interesting material, is frustrating and confusing. On the flipside, given the strength of the warm-cold eeriness, particularly in “I,” this is a testament to Abstraction’s generally high quality. It’s probably better for an album to improve over its runtime than deteriorate.

All things considered, Abstraction deserves your patience. Short, but not forgettable, it might lend itself most immediately to distracted introspection, as with much of atmospheric music of its ilk. Yet beyond the haze, Abstraction contains genuine weirdness that’s just beautiful and dreamlike to capture the less-extreme-inclined, and real elegance that is but a few strokes away from the avant-garde. Dysylumn are on the precipice of something wonderful; they just need to find it.

Rating: Good
DR: 9 | Format Reviewed: 320kbps mp3
Label: Signal Rex
Websites: Bandcamp | Facebook
Releases Worldwide: October 17th, 2025

#2025 #30 #Abstraction #AtmosphericBlackMetal #BlackMetal #BlutAusNord #Dysylumn #FrenchMetal #Oct25 #Review #Reviews #SignalRex

Blut Aus Nord - Shadows Breathe First

https://open.qobuz.com/track/352955622

https://www.last.fm/music/Blut+aus+Nord/_/Shadows+Breathe+First

#Music #BlackMetal #BlutAusNord

Mein Tipp für den heutigen #BandcampFriday :

Die neue #blutausnord #etherealhorizons kann mensch seit heute vorbestellen.

Allmächd! #BlutAusNord veröffentlicht am 28.11. „Ethereal Horizons“.
YouTube-Video zu ‚Shadows Breathe First‘: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtNT-lDPEQA

🔗 https://gloomr.de/#1593

#NowPlaying #NeuesAlbum

Cult Burial – Collapse of Pattern, Reverence of Dust Review

By Thus Spoke

It has always overwhelmed me just how much music is out there, ceaselessly being recorded in studios and basements and forests, ceaselessly being promoted and released, and often sent into the AMG promo pile. There is so much more below the surface than above it, even as regards just one small subgenre. How can one possibly listen to it all, and discern greatness from mediocrity? How can bands stand out when countless others are branding themselves so similarly, making music so apparently similar? Cult Burial are one such band that I would likely never have come across were it not for this gig, despite the generally positive reception both their debut and sophomore albums received (the latter also coming from me). In that review, I highlighted what I perceived to be a distinctiveness to the band’s sound, their particular mixture of death, black, and post-metal sounding just different enough to give them an edge, minor hiccoughs notwithstanding. Then, Cult Burial was in the perfect position to capitalize on these unique strengths and refine the formula, and it is after two years in the shadows that the fruit of their labors falls into my hands.

LP 3, Collapse of Pattern, Reverence of Dust, is immediately and strikingly more imposing than its predecessor. More menacing in its melodies and more aggressive in its stronger leanings towards deathened territory, it also sounds literally sharper, with fewer instances of guitar being relegated to a background bit-part and more of them center-stage in the leading role. The music is atmospheric in a similarly echoing way, again recalling Praise the Plague, but now this atmosphere treads into the more unsettling territory accompanied by jarring chord progressions, akin to Akhlys (“Vincula,” “Vestige”), or even Blut Aus Nord (“Mire”), though decidedly less manic. This new sense of malice goes a long way toward giving Cult Burial a stronger hold on the listener, and helping them avoid the issue of image-sound incongruence that haunted Reverie of the Malignant.

What hasn’t changed about Cult Burial’s approach is their preferred compositional structure. Sticking with relatively brief song lengths, they rely on melodic and rhythmic hooks (“Aether,” “Vestige”) that keep the pace high between the atmospheric intros and interludes, rather than extended creeping builds. This risk didn’t entirely pay off in the last outing, but Collapse of Pattern sees a renewed vigor that makes songs, which pack in blackened doom and death in a signature smoky style with a more ‘conventional’ black or death metal solo or bridge, tonally fluid despite their fluctuations. The prevailing tone of meanness is a markedly more consistent and coherent than previously, and this now shines through most strongly where Cult Burial turn to the tangled zone of dissonance in their extreme metal leanings, which takes the humming chords and minor melodies—not to mention the pleasantly audible purr of the bass—into a realm of creepy that’s thoroughly, spine-tinglingly enjoyable (“Vincula,” “Enthrall,” “Beseech”).

The main problem is that, however cool or chilling various passages are—and they are—Collapse of Pattern never does enough to fully arrest its audience. A seeming impatience to get to the next bit compounds paradoxically with a reluctance to ever progress beyond the inevitable switch from slower intro to faster heaviness. It makes the music feel underdeveloped in two senses. On the one hand, by lack of builds and by not actually possessing the presence they tease with an overly mysterious and surface-level atmospheric aura—marked by heavy resonance. On the other hand, by the near absence of dynamism in the yet fickle and multifaceted compositions, which sway from an ominous death-doom into a distinctly tech-death acerbity. While Cult Burial made strides when it comes to improving their overall vibe—as in, there’s no longer a strange tonal separation between different songs as there was before—their music indicates that they still feel unsure of their identity. Simultaneously trying too hard to sound dark and huge and frightening, and not trying hard enough to craft a convincingly solid presence that would justify it.

Collapse of Pattern feels like one step forward, two steps back. On every listen, I am drawn in by opener “Vincula”‘s malevolently stomping, eerily moaning refrain. By the time I have reached its back half, however, it no longer grips me; songs bleed together and dissolve. Cult Burial may still have something great in them, but until they dive fully into the void or write some killer riffs, they are doomed to fade into obscurity.

Rating: Mixed
DR: 6 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: Self-Released
Websites: cultburial.com | cultburial.bandcamp.com | facebook.com/cultburial
Released Worldwide: September 5th, 2025

#25 #2025 #AKhlys #BlackMetal #BlackenedDeathMetal #BlackenedDoom #BlutAusNord #CollapseOfPatternReverenceOfDust #CultBurial #DeathMetal #PraiseThePlague #Review #Reviews #SelfReleases #Sep25 #UKMetal

Nail By Nail – Embraced by Darkness Review

By Alekhines Gun

There’s a reason why all who apply for demotion to writer in these halls are given the same first assignment: Write a 2.5 review. Trying to whip up a good treatise on why an album is middling, meandering, and mediocre can be difficult, particularly when trying to fill up word count requirements and hopefully stay clever and entertaining at the same time. But every so often, writers can be blessed with the opposite problem, when an album materializes into your hands and manages to do nothing overly extraordinary and still succeeds at being a captivating, enjoyable experience. German upstarts Nail By Nail have emerged seemingly out of nowhere, forming in 2023 with no customary demos or lead-up releases before presenting the world with their debut LP Embraced by Darkness. For once, I will skip the fluff and tantalizing lead-in and cut right to the punchline: This is a good album by a fledgling young band, and I am delighted to announce that it is worthy of your time.

Embraced by Darkness uses a well-trodden offering of sound to create music that is familiar while still being noteworthy. All the ingredients any experienced listener is looking for will be present: melodic tremolos, vocals which could shatter glass with their pitch, explosive styled speedy beats and occasional punky chord progressions. Nail By Nail eschew typical second-wave trappings and barbed wire tones, instead opting for a cleaner production palette where everything gets ample room to breathe in the mix, including the bass. The DR allows the album to sound positively lush, among the best I’ve heard in modern black metal. These little touches give moments like the bass and melody interplay of “Crooked Nails” haunting qualities which worm into the listeners’ ears, and the crushing, staccato-laced modern Gorgoroth assault of “Cosmic Fire” real power without drums covering up riffs or vice versa. Across the entirety of Embraced by Darkness, the listener is treated to an album that is pleasant on the ear and gripping to the soul without studio tricks or artificial heaviness by way of compression.

The difference maker for Nail By Nail is the strength of compositions and songwriting. “The Frozen Tomb” manages to use a simple melody to conjure up a whiff of old school Rotting Christ grandeur and triumph. Guitarists Lars H. and Tobias R. switch between groovy riff to foul assault with mercurial seamlessness, with drummer Noel A. using an excellent sense of fills to switch between regular blasts and knowing when to push just that little bit faster for the climax of the composition. Tiny flourishes of piano and smatterings of atmospheric lead in peppers songs with character, with melodies reaching for the cosmic sense of the more beautiful works of Blut Aus Nord in scope if not in technical prowess. Across the entirety of the release, Embraced by Darkness feints towards bigger names with bigger accomplishments, but manages to cobble all the ingredients together into a sound entirely the band’s own.

This strength in songwriting, combined with the exquisite production, leads to Embraced by Darkness being far greater than the sum of its parts. True, as a debut, there are still kinks to be worked out. Track sequencing is a bit uneven, with two doomy openers in a row giving the impression that the album is more mid-paced than it is, with the faster songs bookending the release. “Dagger Nights” makes one last effort at bringing blackened fire to the proceedings but feels a bit anti-climactic given the mood and melodicism of the preceding half hour. Nevertheless, as an individual cut, it presents quality, and indicates something more lethal waiting in the gestating processes of the band’s writing.

Embraced by Darkness has been a challenging listen in the best sense of the term. The more particular listener will note that every single element of praise has been done bigger and better by some other band, and yet Nail By Nail have crafted an engaging, beautiful release which I have enjoyed my time with on each spin. Spacious production and a keen ear for simple but efficient melody have been wielded into tools of promise by this young outfit, and if they can hone their compositional skillset into something more predatory, I believe the future is bright. For now, despite any lack of true surprises, Embraced by Darkness has been a delightful discovery, and any lovers of melodic black metal should give it a chance.

Rating: 3.0/5.0
DR: 11 | Format Reviewed: 320 kbps mp3
Label: War Anthem Records
Websites: Official Bandcamp | Official Facebook Page
Releases Worldwide: May 9th, 2025

#2025 #30 #BlackMetal #BlutAusNord #EmbracedByDarkness #GermanMetal #Gorgoroth #May25 #NailByNail #Review #Reviews #RottingChrist #WarAnthemRecords

Namebearer – Industries of the Fading Sun Review

By Twelve

I’ve a sneaking suspicion that the apocalypse isn’t actually as metal as everyone thinks it is. Can’t explain it, won’t elaborate—that’s just my gut feeling. Despite this, I can’t quite pass up a promo that promises “hazy visions of an apocalyptic world,” as Industries of the Fading Sun does. This album, a purported work of atmospheric black metal from US-based Namebearer, is their debut release and contains all the promise and potential a debut can have within it. How does it stand up to the mighty visions it aims to evoke?

The first thing to notice about Industries of the Fading Sun—the thing that stands out immediately upon pressing play—is the stifling, lo-fi production punch dominating the low end of the record. There’s plenty more to notice as the title track lurches to life, but that fuzzy, thick aura of black metal days gone by that aims right for your throat from second one is the dominating factor. Throughout the song, and indeed the album, this hazy, atmospheric, almost psychedelic quality allows it to blend multiple styles under a roughly black metal umbrella—synths and drawn out guitar leads evoke melodic ideas while the heavy backdrop of riffs give it the promised raw, atmoblack quality. Brian Tenison’s (Eave, Obsidian Tongue) vocals are raspy and vicious, while Brendan Hayter’s (Thrawsunblat, Obsidian Tongue) are clean and straightforward.1 The Blut Aus Nord/Wolves in the Throne Room inspiration is apparent, but put together, Namebearer boasts a sound very much its own.

That’s a win for Industries of the Fading Sun, but you might see it as a drawback too. On an album just barely inching past what we’d call an EP ’round these parts—it doesn’t quite reach the half hour mark—there is a lot going on. “Lumivyöry” is a good example, opening with a sense of urgency—wry tremolos and anguished screaming guide the song through to its halfway mark, where it takes a turn for the dramatic—low, short riffs, clean intoning, narration. From there, a synth lead carries the rest of the song to its end. It’s almost progressive in how unpredictable it is, but it does work, and “Lumivyöry” stands as one of the strongest songs here. On the other hand, it can make it difficult to distinguish individual songs; at first, Industries of the Fading Sun felt more like a long, single song than a collection befitting an album, owing to its comparatively short runtime and the consistency with which its structures, ideas, and paces change.

Ultimately, this disjointed sense of style is the most significant thing that holds Industries of the Fading Sun back. “Black Vein, Atom Drum” is a good example. It’s a grim and brutal piece that rolls and grinds, where the cleanly-sung chorus is the only sense of melody afforded to the whole—which makes it feel out-of-place when you first hear it. Hayter’s synths come in and out of the spotlight sporadically, but dominate “Crystals Distill to New Earth,” ending Industries of the Fading Sun on a very different note from its opener. I’ve already mentioned the strong fuzziness on each song, and the clean singing too, but often these two choices are strongly at odds with each other. Whether through guitars, synths, or singing, most of Namebearer’s melodic impulses fight against the lo-fi, black metal base that naturally takes up most of the listener’s attention—even more strongly than the drumming, which is often swallowed up by the void, robbing the journey of immediacy. Is that an intentional choice? It could well be—Industries of the Black Sun borrows inspiration from quite a few places, but I struggle to definitely name it one thing.

Of course, that’s not a bad thing on its own, but I feel like Industries of the Fading Sun never quite comes together for Namebearer. It aims high and does a lot, but is held back by a lack of cohesion, by seeming to not quite know exactly what it is just yet. The vision is there; hopefully that means there is something stronger on the horizon. There are many promising moments across Industries of the Fading Sun. I would love to hear an album full of them, so I’ll still be keeping an eye out for what Namebearer does next.

Rating: 2.5/5.0
DR: 5 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Self release
Website: namebearer.bandcamp.com
Releases Worldwide: May 2nd, 2025

#25 #2025 #AmericanMetal #AtmosphericBlackMetal #BlutAusNord #Eave #IndustriesOfTheFadingSun #May25 #Namebearer #ObsidianTongue #Review #Reviews #SelfRelease #Thrawsunblat #WolvesInTheThroneRoom

I dag har 'Hallucinogen' av Blut Aus Nord gått på repeat. Enda en sopp x metal crossover! Var litt ambivalent i begynnelsen, for er ikke dette litt vel "voksent"? De pusher grensene for hva som kan kalles black metal, men hva er vel black metal i våre dager uansett? Låter ikke like psykedelisk som coveret og tittelen antyder, men det er en velprodusert vegg av lyd med chanting og harmonier som gir meg gåsehud. Vel verdt en lytt!

https://blutausnord.bandcamp.com/album/hallucinogen

#blackmetal #metallheimen #BlutAusNord

Sluttet å sjekke ut ny metal rundt 2010, så har en del å ta igjen. @HaavardTveito anbefalte at jeg skulle sjekke ut de nye greiene til franske Blut Aus Nord.

Det er tett, mørkt og disharmonisk. Sånn som det skal være. Litt som å være ute i sterk vind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WHSZ7FE5M0

#BlackMetal #metallheimen #BlutAusNord

Doedsmaghird – Omniverse Consciousness Review

By Thus Spoke

I, too, did a doubletake when I first read Doedsmaghird. Your brain isn’t playing tricks, Doedsmaghird is a project of Dødheimsgard vocalist and guitarist Yusaf “Vicotnik” Parvez and Camille Giradeau respectively. And the two bands are related in more than name and members. Debut Omniverse Consciousness could believably be another Dødheimsgard record, sounding, as it does, like a natural extension of Dødheimsgard’s signature sound. Exploring further along the vividly electronic path that Black Medium Current set out, Doedsmaghird brings in—or brings back—the wildness and irreverence that Vicotnik largely set aside for that album. Did you hear Black Medium Current and think it was a bit soft, that Vicotnik had lost his edge and everything was far too ‘ordinary’? Do you just want extra Dødheimsgard? Awaken to the Omniverse Consciousness.

Doedsmaghird makes music the way Dødheimsgard does; by which I mean music that accurately replicates the experience of hearing technical extreme metal whilst on mushrooms.1. Rather than assault with mud-drenched gutturals and impossible patterns of string and drum, Omniverse Consciousness evades accessibility through weirdness. Blips, whooshes, jabs, yips, chimes, and throbs of electronically conjured noise are this outing’s distinctive element of wackiness, accompanying—if not dominating—the riffs and drum work. This is, of course, in addition to the expected unhinged vocals that lurch from croaks, to wailing moans, to surprisingly mellifluous cleans. Sometimes it even sounds like everything is being played backwards. But it works. The duo say of the album that it was conceived with more spontaneity and freedom than recent Dødheimsgard output, and this comes through in how jam-packed with ideas, and elastic in its transitions it is. But unlike A Umbra Omega, Doedsmaghird’s debut isn’t pure sonic schizophrenia; it isn’t sharp and abrasive. Rather, it’s an uncomfortable dream, one that stays just on the right side of becoming a nightmare, its strangeness found in the dominance of synth-soundscapes that mould a black metal no one else could replicate.

What’s so impressive about Omniverse Consciousness is the contradiction inherent within it. With individual movements dissonant, real harmony sings through overall. With multiple jarring elements playing on top of one another, cohesion arises from the chaos. Doedsmaghird neither supplement their black metal with experimental electronica nor supplement their electronica with experimental black metal; the two genres are simply one here. Sometimes, this means overtly psychedelic and wobbly à la Blut Aus Nord (“Endless Distance”), others something far more exotic. The clicks and pulses accompanying demonic croaking narration (“Death of Time”), clipped, squeaky moans (“Sparker Inn Apne Dorer”), and jangly yelps and yips of…something (“Then, To Darkness Return”) separately appear grating. But like an apparently unnatural dab of colour in an impressionist painting, they are essential to the picture, and collectively compose something wonderful. Doedsmaghird really seem to be able to do whatever they like, and pull it off. A suddenly thunking, cardboard drum tone (“Min tid er omme”); whiplashing between whooping, sampled moans, and dissonant black metal (“Sparker Inn Apne Dorer,” “Then, To Darkness Return”); playing tremolo riffs to a clacky trap beat (“Adrift into Collapse”). I wouldn’t blame you for thinking it all sounds awful. But, by some magic, it isn’t. Throwing two fingers to the traditional idea of tension and release, Doedsmaghird take you by surprise with (their version of) synthwave and mournful cleans (“Heart of Hell”), enigmatic piano (“Endeavour”) and the coalescence of warbling synth and burring guitar (“Min tid er omme”) being suddenly beautiful.

Before long, you won’t even remember thinking anything about Omniverse Consiousness was ‘that weird’. Soon you’ll notice more and more that there is actually a plethora of harmoniousness on display, and that everything transitions as logically as can be. The sliding keyboards shine (“Heart of Hell”), lurching drum patterns blend slickly into whirring thuds of noise (“Then, To Darkness Return”), bubbles and pops melded to burring tremolos whoosh into fun, compelling melodies (“Endless Distance,” “Min tid er omme”), and more! Doedsmaghird also ice this beautifully mad, moist cake with a rich fondant of stellar production, meaning that you get your money’s worth on the creative intricacies they throw in at every beat, and the insanity is just that much more immersive. Better yet, it’s little more than three-quarters of an hour long, making it far more digestible and eligible for repeat listens.

Omniverse Consciousness is just an extra portion of modern Dødheimsgard. But this is not “the Dødheimsgard at home,” it’s a bona-fide helping of the real deal. It may not be as epic as Black Medium Current, but for how little time it’s been, it’s phenomenal. Further developing and twisting the electronic edge into a black metal only they know how, Doedsmaghird shows that its creators stand head and shoulders above the crowd. Embrace the Omniverse Consciousness.

Rating: Great
DR: 10 | Format Reviewed: 320kbps mp3
Label: Peaceville
Website: Bandcamp
Releases Worldwide: October 11th, 2024

#2024 #40 #AvantGardeMetal #BlackMetal #BlutAusNord #Dödheimsgard #Doedsmaghird #ExperimentalBlackMetal #NorwegianMetal #Oct24 #OmniverseConsciousness #Peaceville #Review #Reviews

Aodon - Atmospheric BM from France

https://aodon.bandcamp.com/album/portraits

#blackmetal #atmosphericblackmetal #france #gojira #alcest #blutausnord

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#BraveWords
Today In Metal History 🤘 September 20th, 2024🤘
OZZY OSBOURNE, AC/DC, EXTREME, BULLETBOYS, YES, OPETH

https://bravewords.com/news/today-in-metal-history-september-20th-2024-ozzy-osbourne-ac-dc-extreme-bulletboys-yes-opeth

#OZZYOSBOURNE #ACDC #EXTREME #BULLETBOYS #YES #OPETH #STYX #CINDERELLA #BRITNYFOX #SABBAT #SKYCLAD #NELSON #SOUNDGARDEN #METALLICA #MOTÖRHEAD #BONJOVI #GODFORBID #HIRAX #STORMLORD #THEAGONIST #ASILAYDYING #BLUTAUSNORD #CULTOFLUNA #EXHORDER #KOBRAANDTHELOTUS #MICHAELSCHENKERFEST #THENUMBERTWELVELOOKSLIKEYOU

Coming to the end of my BaN journey (a journey I take often) with Lovecraftian Echoes.

Who doesn't love a bit of Lovecraft with their Metal? 🤘

#blutausnord #nowplaying #blackmetal #metal