Nightbringer have produced an explosive piece of work here that is nothing short of electrifying at times. Gigantic riffs battling criss-crossing tremolo guitars, half a dozen different vocal styles and around 70 minutes of epic, occult-inspired black metal. On many levels this is an impressive recording and a huge step forward from Hierophany Of The Open Grave. So why do I have the nagging feeling that it is going to divide opinion? Well, navigating all the hype, the negativity, the pan continental, Europe versus the US debate that always rears its ugly head with a band like this is one thing. Absorbing the sheer scale and density of Nightbringer’s evolving sound is another. But finding myself in the right mood to get my head round it all was the tricky thing. The key to it all was always going to be finding the right time and place to submerse myself. So after a few listens and finding myself sitting by the window staring up at a darkening, featureless, overcast sky it all began to click into place. Because the trick with an entity like Nightbringer is not to find and disassemble all the moving parts and the myriad influences. It’s trying to ignore it all and just let the music melt into one crackling black void.
Such a deeply layered sound can be too clever for its own good for one thing. It requires extreme skill but then it all becomes too clinical. But compare that to my personal view of what makes the best of the swirling mass of ‘occult’ black metal work: organic, hypnotic and charged with simmering intent – almost like the genius elements were chanced upon while stumbling around in seething drug-fuelled rage worshipping the nether realms. Hierophany Of The Open Grave was an album that more easily, if not perfectly, slotted into that. But this time round Nightbringer has evolved to another level of intensity. The new sound, the blurring speeds and the epic length are not going to be everyone’s goblet of goat’s blood but there is no doubt that Nightbringer have upped their game significantly.
Ego Dominus Tuus still has the aesthetic and the rasping sermonising of the best examples of the genre I’ve come across recently such as Avichi, Order of Orias and Imperial Triumphant. But then it pockets all that and begins to rise above its predecessor it in a violent, focused blast. There is a reverence to Emperor’s Anthems To The Welkin At Dusk that runs right through this but is particularly evident on Et Nox Illuminatio Mea In Deliciis Meis. But there’s also a bit of Dimmu Borgir in that the arrangements are so grand and that production is so tightly wound. That’s not meant as the criticism some might take it to be – Ego has a heartfelt vibrancy and emotion that sets it apart from a lot of what Dimmu have produced, certainly in the last decade or so.
But once you can put that to one side, the raging intensity of Ego begins to carry you along with it. After the typically predictable intro the album actually gets off to a bit of a clumsy start, maybe it’s just me but the piercing tremolo riff on Et Nox Illuminatio Mea In Deliciis Meis is a little distracting and was a little too close to The Loss And Curse Of Reverence. But the following track Lantern of Eden’s Night convincingly washes all that away in a sudden, black, tidal surge. And from there Ego does not let up for a single moment. There are standout moments such as Lantern Of Eden’s Night and The Otherness Of Being. But something like this really needs to be taken in as a whole not on a track by track basis to absorb the scale ambition of the album. At the end of the day, if the flawlessness of Ego Dominus Tuus means that the album sometimes lacks charm, then it more than makes up for that with its skill, aggression and sheer power.
(8/10 Reverend Darkstanley)
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