My sheer love for the grotesqueries that
come out of Finland cannot be questioned. Yes, I’m talking about the Finnish
death metal scene, a plentiful pile of rot and macabre decay, putrid and abominable
in every way. But besides the death metal scene in Finland to emerge in the 90’s,
there’s also a cult underground black metal scene, quite extensive yes, but
still dwarfed by the captivating copiousness of the death metal scene. There
were a few bands that the black metal underground respected and knew, but
Nidhoggr is just not one of those exulted bands. Listening to their 1994 demo ‘’Ravens
Over The Road Of Kings’’ is like Burzum gnawing against your ears with stark
strictness, and amongst so many false imitators, finally comes a band who knows
how to worship.
Yes, a Burzum scent reeks heavily in every
riff, every break, every turn and twist; in every aspect. ‘’Ravens’’ is a
relatively short demo, consisting of only three songs, but once you enter its
frigid cold atmosphere it’s not easy to get out as you’re always in the grip of
grim, sombre winter, absolutely blood chilling and glacial. The instrumentation
is sheer brilliance I tell you. Brilliance. The riffs are set on a damp, jagged
texture and flow with craggy, angular turns, and the production is exceedingly
raw and diminishing, so the tremolo pickings will always be reduced in vivacity
and fullness, and you’ll need to crank the volume up if you want to properly
hear this one. Atmospheric traits are just as favoured as the dreary elements
of the music. Every riff is harsh, abrupt attack, but at the same time, it
provokes an epic sense, which is always a pleasant thing to hear in your black
metal.
Even the vocals, sonically intense and
gelid screams and harsh rasps remind me of Burzum, and these rasps are so cold
and haunting that I can say that they’re even better than Varg’s vocals
performance, even though they seldom tend to appear. ‘’Thou Shalt Burn At Our
Stacker’’ carves a deep hole into the listener’s ear from the start, giving of
a great impact of cold, grim melancholy and other raw aspects of the demo, and ‘’From
The Forest Come The Wanderer’’ begins its six minute journey with brief little
melody spectrum, flashing into an crude, cavernous tremolo attack afterwards.
The concluding track finalizes the demo with a queer plethora of melodies and
turns cutting and splashing onto each other with cantankerous complexity and
cunning. I have no doubt that any Norwegian black metal fan will find this
entertaining (though in a eerie way), and Burzum fans especially will salivate over this.
Highlights
''Thou Shalt Burn At Our Stacker''
''From The Forest Come The Wanderer''
Final Rating
Awesome [8.8/10]
