siLLy puPPy Some thirty years into its existence, BLUT AUS NORD which stared as Vlad in 1993 has lost none of its unique charm in the world of experimental metal with its unique brand of psychedelic electronica merging seamlessly with atmospheric black metal. While starting out in the second wave black metal scene, Vindsval and his cronies have continued to ratchet up the BLUT AUS NORD experience by consistently pushing in the envelope in developing horrific soundscapes that are suitable for as soundtracks for some interdimensional hellish setting.

Following a now already established pattern of cranking out a trilogy of overarching themes, the DISHARMONIUM set that began with last year’s “Undreamable Abysses” becomes even more blood curdling with its followup NAHAB, a word that means “love” in the Arabic language but brings no warm and fuzzies to mind as it pummels with black metal brutality in tandem with suffocating atmospheric anxiety. Fueled with dissonant guitar workouts and cyclical post-rock inspired patterns of repetition, NAHAB takes things laid down on previous albums and turns up the dial a few notches.

This is one of those albums that matches the album cover art perfectly as it truly feels like an astral disaster in the making, one where you are literally paralyzed in fear as nefarious multi-dimensional entities suck out your very life force like one of those bogeys in the Harry Potter movies. Once again BLUT AUS NORD owes its terror tactics to the inspiring artistic world of H.P. Lovecraft and like the dreaded Cthulhu of Lovecraftian legend, unleashes its tentacles to ensnare its prey into a metaphysical battle for your very soul.

The secret to BLUT AUS NORD’s success is that the band never strays too far from an overall theme and the unique sound that gelled all the way back with “Memoria Vetusta I: Father’s Of The Icy Age.” Just like the subtle ratcheting up of tension that graces each and every release, these guys know how to keep the basics of what came before and change it up just enough to offer a new perspective of a true and tried vision. Through this process BLUT AUS NORD has become somewhat of a legend in what i would first and foremost refer to as horror metal, a type of psychological mind fuck metal that transcends the pigeonholed terms such as black metal, progressive metal or atmospheric black metal.

In my opinion, DISHARMONIUM - NAHAB has pretty much perfected the BLUT AUS NORD experience by maintaining its dedication to the second wave black metal wrath accompanied by knotty avant-prog styled time signature changes and experimentalism. Add to that the perfect atmospheric black ambience that does the cosmic dance with its metal counterpart. Take for example the track “The Black Vortex” where the incessant hornet sounding buzzsaw guitars, the frenetic jazzy drumming, the suffocating atmospherics and the overall doom and gloom despair Lovecrafted into an eternal source of sonic bleakness and you can’t help but be blown away.

It seems this band is in no danger of running out of steam and one that only grows better and bolder with each release. Far ahead of the competition, BLUT AUS NORD pretty had a decade’s run of albums ahead of the pack but even some three decades later still exudes a sense of mastery and mastery absent from many old timers who have rested on their laurels rather than climbing the Jacob’s ladder of inspiration. This latest offering from these French underground superstars of the extreme metal world blows away anything they’ve done in a long time. The perfect marriage of second wave black metal laid down on “Ultima Thulée” married with the atmospheric perfection of the “Memoria Vestusta” releases but adds the chaotic mind fuckery of “MoRT. In short, experimental black metal perfection.

siLLy puPPy Having gestated in the fertile French black metal scene of the 1990s, the Mondeville based BLUT AUS NORD has been quite instrumental in bridging the gap between the worlds of atmospheric black metal and psychedelic electronica and has produced some of the most memorable experiences of surreal metal especially in the 21st century with the mind bending musical antics of “The Work That Transforms God” and beyond. While many a black metal act seems stuck on autopilot, BLUT AUS NORD is one of those rare acts that remains utterly unique in pretty every way and some 30 years on still is crafting the same styles of bestial black metal in fine form.

The power quartet of VIndsval (vocals, guitar), W.D. Feld (drums, electronics, keyboards), GhÖst (bass) and Thorns (drums) returns with its 15th powerhouse DISHARMONIUM - UNDREAMABLE ABYSSES. With an album cover that comes just in time to make one think of the new Dr Strange flick about the Multiverse, it also seems fitting that the bizarre sounds unleashed on this bizarre avant-garde display of black metal and dark ambience does indeed sound like a stroll through some strange path in between universes. Once again BLUT AUS NORD delivers the perfect ingredients of an ominous journey into a hypnotic atmospheric series of soundscapes that teeter between absolute dissonance and infernal elegance.

Like many of the modern BLUT AUS NORD releases, this one sort of oozes its way from beginning to end with a mix of heavy guitar riffs, hyperactive percussion, oscillating sound effects and buried vocals that sound just as out there as ever. While BLUT AUS NORD may not be covering any new ground, i have to say that these guys really don’t need to either. They have successfully inculcated a unique style that even decades later sounds like no other. The impeccable mix of the metal and ambient parts that swarm around like a mad swarm of hornets attacking a choir is literally intoxicating as the music is unrelenting and unsettlingly surreal!

This time around DISHARMONIUM - UNDREAMABLE ABYSSES features seven hypnosis inducing tracks that all sort of gel together fairly comfortably but as an album of this magnitude where the freakery dial is turned up to 11 and beyond, the album is merciful in that it doesn’t exceed much beyond the 46 minute mark. This is truly music that can test your very sanity and too much exposure may indeed cause some sort of mental breakdown of some sort! I happen to have thick skin so i personally love this bizarre chimeric musical display and even though BLUT AUS NORD continues to stick to its formula, it’s one that i personally never grow tired of one little bit.

Still no idea what to call this. Some sort of industrial black metal that utilizes elements from post-rock, dark ritual ambient, depressive black metal and even a bit of stoner doom metal here and there. Whatever this madness it, you cannot mistake these sounds for anything other than the inimitable BLUT AUS NORD which remains one of the French scene’s most dynamic and prolific extreme metal acts. While every album is firmly in the BLUT AUS NORD camp, the band has been clever in how it switches things up subtly from one album to the next and this 15th installment is by no means the exception. Expect elements from the “Memoria” releases as well as the “777” trilogy and beyond. As bleak and inaccessible as ever, BLUT AUS NORD remains one of my favorite extreme metal acts of all time.

siLLy puPPy While beginning as the one-man solo project of Vindsval, the French experimental freak show known as BLUT AUS NORD really came into its own once the lineup was expanded to a trio that included drummer / keyboardist W.D. Feld and bassist GhÖst. Already having crafted some of the most chilling atmospheric black metal albums in the vein of Burzum, the trio version of BLUT AUS NORD shocked the black metal world with its lauded masterwork “The Work That Transforms God” which ironically transformed the world of second wave Norwegian style black metal into a stranger nebulous world of surreality that incorporated as much dark ambient psychedelia as it did black metal heft.

After reaching the apex of its industrial dark ambient infused alternative universe where black metal was forced to perform unthinkable acts with thick gnarled atonal guitar antics painfully decrying the jagged prog infused percussive beats, the album “MoRT” found this stylistic approach finding its logical conclusion with seemingly nowhere left to go but BLUT AUS NORD proved to be a wily beast that was content with experimenting and then perfecting said experiment and then moving on altogether without abandoning the underpinning of the band’s experimental and progressive black metal stylistic approach. While downright normal compared to “MoRT,” the band followed up with ODINIST - THE DESTRUCTION OF REASON BY ILLUMINATION which borrowed its title from the magickal world of none other than Aleister Crowley.

Decidedly less otherworldly and more anchored in contemporary atmospheric black metal that had taken the 2000s by storm, ODINIST retains the general characteristics that had graced the band’s previous two albums, namely the buzzsaw guitar riffs casting larger than life distorted feedback, bantering bass lines buried beneath the sonic swells and the irregular drum rolls that colluded to craft a bizarre atonal callithump through hellish soundscapes. However on ODINIST all that came before is toned down manyfold in order to craft a somewhat more accessible, or at least more orthodox black metal experience. While “MoRT” cast the strangest of sonic spells with a never-ending supply of jagged irregular jazz-fueled percussion, ODINIST takes on the more standard approach of blastbeats and less jagged progressive time signature attacks. This is all relative of course as ODINIST is much more avant-garde than the average black metal album.

Likewise the compositions lie more in the realm of standard black metal than the experimental freeform avant-garde tendencies of the previous two albums. While the newbie to this band may find this one to be more accessible due to the more standardized approach complete with the expected raspy vocals and less frenetic zigzagging effect, ODINIST to my ears sounds like a few steps down in quality and creative expression as the album tends to feel to safe for its own good in comparison to the albums that preceded and the excellent “777” trilogy that followed. While ODINIST hits all the marks that makes BLUT AUS NORD stand out from the pack, the album feels like it’s running on automatic pilot rather than tackling something completely fresh however occasional such as on tracks like “Ellipsis,” the doppler effect style of “MoRT” is more prominent.

In many ways ODINIST feels like a Viking metal style album with scattered melodic nods to Norwegian folk music with even the title referring to the god of Norse mythology. On board with the caustic black metal which had been amped up from the previous works, the dark ambient and industrial elements still teem with life however they are also kept on the leash as the compositional style is more predictable and less prone to crafting intangible elements that leave the listener in a cold bewildering reality devoid of any Earthly connections. ODINIST in its 37 minute run is nothing but a decent and compelling atmospheric black metal album experience however i can never shake the feeling that it just doesn’t rise to the standards that BLUT AUS NORD had set so high just the year before. Not my personal favorite but a must for fans no doubt.

siLLy puPPy While second wave of black metal was without a doubt the product of Norwegian wrath against humankind and religious practices with plenty of church burnings to add some visuals, the relative adaptive nature of the buzzsaw guitar led bombast and simple song structures allowed various elements to hybridize quite quickly making black metal one of the most versatile subgenera in the entire metal universe. While Darkthrone, Emperor, Immortal and Mayhem may have led Norway’s darkened dramatic take on the 80s metal that evolved into the 90s, it became clear in the 2000s that France was taking the lead having created some of the most unique experimental examples of taking black metal into surreal new realities.

The one man band BLUT AUS NORD also known as Vindsval took the atmospheric black metal approach of Burzum and Naglfar and adopted some of the first traces of psychedelic rock as far back as “Ultime Thulée” in 1995 but once the BLUT AUS NORD project became a fully fueled band beginning with 2003’s “The Work Which Transforms God,” Vindsval and friends took the black metal world by storm by crafting a new level of sophistication that had never been achieved with depressive chugging atonal guitar riffs enshrouded by suffocating atmospheres and crafting a sonicscape that reflected the frequencies of true hellish underworlds.

Three years later this Mondeville outfit took the stylistic approach on the breakthrough album to its logical conclusion with the fifth full-album MoRT which featured Vindsval on guitar and vocals along with bandmates W.D. Feld on drums and keyboards and GhÖst on bass. The album which pretty much was a continuous flow of bleak mind-numbing surreality which featured eight tracks symbolizing a “Chapter” of a greater nebulous concept never quite defined. The overall mood of the album is terrorizing as MoRT allows you to enter a strange new world where nothing is familiar and excels in atonal deformity unlike anything else that has been experienced before or after.

Beginning with terrifying processed vocals and dark ambient swirls, the atonal amorphous guitar riffs swim in a gelatinous vacuum with abstract drum beats, dissonant swells of distortion and thick depressive atmospheres that sound like single musical notes are tortured until they cease to exude a life force. In many ways MoRT exudes the absolute perfect fusion of black metal textural sensibilities with icy dark ambient atmospherics crafting a perfect balance of calculated metrics. Twisted progressive time signatures slink and slither like magically enhanced serpents writhing out of cold fiery pits in the bowels of the deepest recesses of the underworld, a place so devoid of light and human tangibility that one is reduced to a spiritual cryogenic state of the soul.

Perhaps one of the most adventurous black metal experiences one could possibly encounter, it’s fair to say that BLUT AUS NORD changed the black metal world exponentially with “The Work Which Transforms God” and this even more bizarre example of MoRT which would apparently shift the tectonic plates leading many other French black metal bands like Deathspell Omega and S.V.E.S.T. to adopt some of the deranged harsh tactics employed on this sonic display of freakery. Perhaps the least metal of BLUT AUS NORD’s canon, MoRT excels at being utterly outside the boundaries of virtually anything orthodox in any musical genre. The processed unintelligible vocals that erupt occasionally only add an emphatic sense of horror to the incessant parade of soul splitting awe that lasts for 47 minutes of sonic terror.

Needless to say, MoRT is unlike any other musical experience you could imagine existed and is perhaps one of the most terrifying albums that has ever been produced. Taking on aspects of black metal, dark ambient, progressive rock and even freeform no wave accompanied by a series of deep processed otherworldly growls and the occasional liturgical choirs peaking out of the din, MoRT is without a doubt one that will disturb even the most hardened music lover upon first listen and will send any uninitiated passerby to the insane asylum. This music requires learning an entirely new language in many ways to comprehend as it craftily displays some of the most extreme possibilities of a black-metal-in-opposition approach. While BLUT AUS NORD has crafted some excellent albums in its multi-decade career, it’s this one MoRT that i find the most original and utterly fascinating in its unapologetic experimental rampage.

siLLy puPPy Tucked away between the groundbreaking black metal release “The Work Which Transforms God” and the utter insanity of the following “MoRT,” BLUT AUS NORD dropped its first EP which would lead to a series of EP’s interspersed within the band’s prolific output of albums. While black metal has pretty much been the name of the game since Vindsval started the project as a one-man band back in the 90s, on this first EP verbosely titled THEMATIC EMANATION OF ARCHETYPAL MULTIPLICITY (SOUNDTRACKS FOR SCIENTISTS OF OCCULT SYNCHRETISM), not only does Vindsval (vocals, guitars) and friends W.D. Feld (drums, keyboards) and GhÖst (bass) scream their fascination with esoteric knowledge but take a brief respite away from the black metal world and instead focus on the industrial, dark ambient and dungeon synth sounds that fully blossomed with “The Work” album.

THEMATIC EMANATION is a fascinating procession of gloomy atmospheric stomps through five tracks that for the most part leave out the metal part altogether. The major exception is the track “Level-1 (Nothing Is)” which offers a sneak peak into the bizarre and morbidly twisted guitar torture that would be a prominent feature on the following “MoRT” which fancied the most extreme sound manipulations to craft one of the most psychedelic black metal experiences ever laid down to a recording. Other than that second track, THEMATIC EMANATION focuses on percussive beats and darkened thick atmospheres of impending dread and doom. In fact this could be called doom synth as it’s utterly snail-paced creepy. The EP is only slightly over 28 minutes long and for the most part delivers an interesting mix of variations on percussive beats and dark ambient with some guitars thrown in once in a while.

The sole exception to the dreary setting is the oddball of the bunch, the third track “Level-2 (Nothing Is Not)” which features a trip hop beat, a busy techno styled bass groove and tinny sounding drum machines. While not a bad track say if it were on a Prodigy album or another similar artist, it does sound like a fish out of water on this release although it does have a nice creepy middle section when the percussion and bass drop out. It’s actually danceable and would make a great Goth party remix of some sort!n The following two tracks take a more sinister approach. “Level-3 (Nothing Becomes)” is the freakiest. What sounds like Tibetan bells or chimes exhibit an irregular sort of oddly timed beat while a creepy drone slowly slinks in and out of tune while chanting emanates from dark places along with other styles of weirded out vocals. This actually sounds more like some the industrial band Coil would conjure up in their early years of pure demented glory.

“Exit (Towards The Asylum)” ends the EP with a deranged vocal chant and some weird industrial sounds and before you know it, the short playing time ends which is unusual for BLUT AUS NORD since most albums are close to the hour length. This is a pretty cool album actually. The metal is practically nonexistent save the one track but the band had the opportunity to display all the creepy accompaniments introduced on “The Work” album and allow them to shine in the limelight although light doesn’t actually reach this far down into the abyss. For a metal band, this trio deliver a really interesting take on dark ambient that is quite effective which is why the black metal albums sound so good as this is a vital part but even without the metal, these sounds are quite effective at evoking the bleakest emotive responses. This album is most easily found on the releases of “The Work Which Transforms God” that has this one as a bonus disc, however even if it weren’t so easily obtained as a tagged on freebie, i’d still go out of my way to track this down.