And it's back to the cold we go, north into darkest Scandinavia, back to the cradle fo Black Metal and into Norway, where we find a band who have long split up and only released two albums in their tenure, but are deemed worthy of our attention. Arthemesia were more in the melodic black metal/symphonic metal vein than Atmospheric, I'm told, but definitely should be included.
Devs Iravs --- Arthemesia --- 2001 (Native North Records)
Although Arthemsia focussed on Satanic worship and the occult, they did apparently also believe in alternate religions such as Shamanism and Paganism, and this is interestingly the band Jari Mäenpää left to later form Wintersun, whom we encountered during Metal Month II last year. There's no gentle introduction as harsh fast guitars usher in a snarling vocal and “Blade circle” opens the album. It's a pretty straightforward Satan worship/invocation song, and I can't make out a word as the vocalist, Valtias Mustatuuli, just seems to roar and scream. Wiki tells me this, their first album, was cobbled together from demos, and you can certainly hear the rawness and unevenness in the recordings, which are very poorly produced. This is a pity, really, as Atmospheric Black Metal tends to rely rather heavily on the production in order to get that ambience, and I just don't hear it.
“Universal black” at least begins more low-key, with nice acoustic guitar and low synth, the vocal very low and quiet, almost whispered, then hard electric guitar punches through and the vocal drops in register and gets stronger, so that now it's a rough growl whereas on the previous track it was a sharp scream. There is a really nice sense of almost Power Metal about this now as it rides along, the vocal going back to that scream we heard on the first track. “The breeze of grief” is even moreso, really romping along, and though Valtias tries to “Black Metal it up”, it's hard really to think of this as a Black Metal track of any stripe. Of course, there are the lyrics: “
With that knife and with that laughter/You gently cut your veins/As the breeze of grief binds us together. “ Um, yeah.
A good hard rockout then for “Draconus Infernvs”, which I have to say has no atmospheric or even symphonic elements in it; it's pure traditional metal other than the vocals, though with “Ancestor of magick” we're back to what's expected with string keyboards, grinding guitars and a slow, rolling drumbeat. Multitracked vocals are used here, some of them actually “clean”, which comes as a nice surprise, though the main vocal is driven by Valtias in his screaming screech. There's a definite sense of warrior chant here as the song sways along, though obviously the lyric belies that:
”The evil ship in its tongue/ And the smiling red eyes of horror”. The same basic kind of idea, musically, continues in “Lifemocker”, but overall I'd have to say there's not too much in the way of variety with this band. Maybe that's why they didn't last very long.
Some nice keyboard work and a sort of lamenting voice, but it has to be said that the lyrics are in general pretty awful and make little sense. I mean:
”As I glare upon my scythe/ To see my next realm what to crush/ Once again I clench that helve tight/ And prepare for my feast.” Uh, come again? None of that made any real sense. I know they're Finnish, but even so. “Heaven ablaze” is another rocker, marching along nicely, but it's pretty much Yawnarama City at this stage and everything is sounding strained and very similar. The first of these albums where I think I'll be a lot happier once it's over. “Celebration of the heaven lost” has a kind of progressive feel to it, and a nice kind of anthemic melody.
The final track is a full ten minutes long, and I'm not even sure I can make it through “Whore of the Satan's night”, though to be fair they do seem to vary it a little more here, with some soft, almost gentle passages of guitar, interspersed through the raging, screaming and foaming that makes up most of the song. Hmm. Odd. Looks like it ended with five minutes still to go. Not that I'm complaining mind you. Blessed release really.
TRACKLISTING AND RATINGS
1. Blade circle
2. Universal black
3. The breeze of grief
4. Draconis infernvs
5. Ancestor of magick
6. Lifemocker
7. Heaven ablaze
8. Celebration of the Heaven lost
9. Whore of the Satan's night
I don't think I've enjoyed an Atmospheric Black Metal album (if such this even is) less in all the time I've been writing this article. This came across to me as a cross between standard Black Metal and a sort of symphonic/traditional metal mix. The music was okay, in some cases quite good, but there was so little variety that I couldn't even pick one track from another. The lyrics were totally abysmal and seemed to concentrate more on creating a Satanic atmosphere than actually making any sort of sense, and the vocals were of course indecipherable. All in all, an album I'm happy to forget and let rot in the mists of history. Good riddance.
Back to Germany then we go, to begin the selection proposed by our other oracle,
Grindy. Nyktaglia only lasted from 2001 to 2008 and are now split up, and in that time they released just the two albums, of which this is the first.
Nyktaglia --- Nyktaglia --- 2004 (No Colours Records)
Only four tracks on this, but two are over eleven minutes long, and one is nearly ten. Starts off with a slow, doomy, grinding guitar and morose drumming before the vocalist, who goes by the name of Skjald, screams out and then the drums start to hammer out a much faster beat, the guitar joining them. Nyktalgia were a three-piece, and in addition to the aforementioned singer they had Malfeitor on guitars and bass, and Winterheart on drums. Of course they did. Slows down with a nice melancholy air and even some melody, of all things, about halfway through, as Malfeitor shows us he can do more than just throttle a guitar to death. Well, in this one song there has already been more variety than in the whole of the last album.
Things pick up then for “Lamento Larmoyant”, riding along on a fast, uptempo guitar and breezy percussion, which completely belies the lyrical content, sounding more like something out of a Doom Metal song really, lamenting about the futility of life and the uselessness of hope. You know, the usual cheerful stuff. I suppose the guy's high shrieking voice suits the depressing, despairing lyrics, but I have to say his refusal to come down even a little in his register is really grating on me. I think I'd rather hear someone growl like an animal than have to listen to this. He's back with a big shriek as we move into “Cold void”, the “short” track, at just over seven and a half minutes, and it blasts along with great energy and determination, even though the song is clearly about a suicide attempt. Maybe you could say it's the rage and anger and frustration building up inside him that drives him to take his own life, and so then in that case the music may be appropriate, but for something like this I would have expected more of a dirge really.
Another song about dying and ending it all, “Exitus Latelis” closes the album, and again it's a fast driving rhythm that characterises the song, though it slows down to an almost funeral speed quite early on, picking up again though not as fast. It's sort of hard to write anything about this album though as that scream is really putting me off and the music, while good, is, after the optimism of the first track, kind of staying the same more or less all the way through. Just really boring me to be honest. I just can't be bothered. As Batty would say, f
uck this s
hit. It'll be over in a minute.
TRACKLISTING AND RATINGS
1. Misere noblis
2. Lamento Larmoyant
3. Cold void
4. Exitus Latelis
Yeah, this whole album just annoyed me. From the pathetic lyrics about the many ways the world sucks and the constant, never-changing scream of the singer, it was like listening to a disgruntled teenager wailing about how terrible his life is and he wishes he were dead. I got little enjoyment at all out of that; in fact, I think I preferred the previous guys singing about Satan. At least they had some passion and even evil enjoyment in their music. This was just bland, banal and boring. Never again.
Back to the land of Caladan Brood we travel, to the shores of America and this time to Washington, to tackle a band whose music I have heard once before, but it was a short and, to me at the time, brutal example, as I was still in my phase of not listening to bands with vocals I couldn't understand, essentially death growls. I've no doubt I'll probably still find them too harsh and visceral for my taste, as, apart from anything else, they're on Batlord's favourite br00tal label, Southern Lord. I'm also told their demo was packaged in black fur with moss inside the lyric sheet, so not expecting an easy ride here. Still, perhaps my minimal softening towards and the beginnings of appreciating Black Metal as more than just noise may serve me better than I think.
Or perhaps not. On the plus side, the album we're looking at only has four tracks, however two of them are well over ten minutes, with the closer over eighteen...
Two Hunters --- Wolves in the Throne Room --- 2007 (Southern Lord)
This is the second album from Wolves in the Throne Room, and one of their critically acclaimed ones. They're just a three-man effort, with brothers Nathan and Aaron Weaver on guitar/vocals and drums respectively, and Rick Dahlen also on guitar and vocals. There's a long, lingering instrumental intro that really sounds like it's on synth but I don't see any, so maybe these guys are just really good on their guitars. It's a sort of dramatic, sweeping feel to the music, almost orchestral at times, and the drums bash out slowly like those in a cinema soundtrack with a real sense of symphonic metal here. I'm impressed, but waiting for the sudden punch and kick of raw guitar and that expected harsh vocal to shatter my illusions that this might be a whole lot different than I had anticipated. So far we're almost four minutes into the six that “Dea artio” runs for, and I'm starting to think instrumental.
Very stirring, very emotional, very ambient and I would be surprised if there were any vocals now at this point, so I guess this serves as an introduction and we'll get the hammerblow on the second track. Great start though. “Vastness and sorrow” is one of those longer tracks --- well, the rest are all long really --- coming in at just over twelve minutes. Powerful, effective start, sort of like a slight ramping up of the theme from the opener, the guitars a little harder, the drums a little more forceful, then that screechy voice cuts in for the first time, but I've heard these guys (if only for a minute) and know what to expect. What are the lyrics about? Let's see:
"A dark and fell rider clad in garments of shadow" --- well that's not the milkman, is it?
Guess we're talking your basic average apocalypse here. Not surprisingly, if the throne room is being overrun by wild beasts, is it? Guitar work is really great; builds up a hell of an atmosphere. The “singing” I can live without of course, but you can't have everything. But on balance, yeah, I really like this a lot.
A mere ten minutes is all “Cleansing” runs for --- and not even that: five seconds short! Lazy bastards!
--- but it opens on a quite startlingly beautiful ambient piece, and if there aren't keys in there I'll be both surprised and impressed. Slow, native style percussion and they bring in guest female vocals from Jessika Kenney, who has a very operatic voice and really changes the whole tone of the music. It's good to be able to hear the vocals for once, and this is a song of seeming victory and celebration in a pagan vein as she sings
”Bathe in the clear cold stream/ Fresh water from the unsullied endless spring that/ Flows from the mountain/We will sing the most ancient song/ Spark the fire upon dry tinder .” Then Nathan ruins it by screaming over it himself and the music gets more intense as the guitars wind up in about the fifth minute.
The final track is the epic among epics, as “I will lay my bones down among the rocks and roots” runs for over eighteen minutes, and starts suitably epically too, with a big guitar intro that takes us into over two minutes of the song before Nathan roars in with his vocal. As we move into the seventh minute the guitars slow down, gradually, very gradually, until they're almost gone, like fading out, and a cold wind blows before they kick up again and take the midsection of the song. Some very effective, again quite tribal drumming here and then the vocal comes back in around the tenth minute. Another great instrumental section driving the last six minutes or so, real feel of a native chant about it, very hypnotic. Fading into a kind of ambient piece now in the thirteenth minute, with almost acoustic, gentle, relaxed guitar before the drums kick in and we head towards the big finish.
TRACKLISTING AND RATINGS
1. Dea artio
2. Vastness of sorrow
3. The cleansing
4. I will lay down my bones among the rocks and roots
Very, very impressed by this. Now that I can manage to look beyond vocals that I don't like or can't comprehend, and just listen to the music, this is an extremely well put together album, especially considering there's little if any digital production, synthesisers, effects or any post-processing. It's raw and it's visceral but it doesn't feel raw and visceral. This does not sound like something recorded in someone's parents' garage, or on a shoestring budget. This sounds really professional, and I'd be interested in hearing more of these guys.