Not a huge amount of information is available about Nattvard who like their name translates we are taking ‘Communion’ with here. They are a duo from Norway and there’s no doubting their mission with Vi Vet gud Er En Løgner which is calling God a Liar and playing true authentic norsk svart metal. The pair behind it are Artyr on musical muscle and Ormr on vokills (along with session drummer Serpentor).
Sticking to olden traditions and roots everything is sermonized in native tongue and clues can easily be divulged about this dastardly duo’s modus operandi with song titles such as ‘Der Tronen Blender, Vender Vi Oss Mot Mørket’ bringing forth the message of manifest darkness like a plague upon the land. This spreads via a hellish sound before the brooding and bass heavy drumming rolls in and suddenly everything drops in and blazes forth. Blood curdling and venomous croaky vocals with a bit of distortion and effect behind them punctuate the full on obliterating drumming and thorny guitar weave. Head-banging is obligatory and this rolls forth crushing all before it like a tank trundling over skulls and grinding them into dust. War has suitably been declared and the band’s volatile munitions gives the likes of Tsjuder a run for their mission to reap and rape the souls of mankind. It’s not all full on though and the pair allow the music to breathe dropping in some parts to stealthily sneak up and reap from afar like a sniper picking off those not falling from the first destructive attack. Indeed numbers like the self-entitled Nattverd stalk and ooze out with a more decrepit and ghoulish nature like fog spreading and choking those not quick enough to mask up and escape its cloying smog. There’s plenty of atmosphere here and it’s easy to get into the relative structures of the music as the drumming goes into a militaristic death march and the vocals rage and vomit out blood.
Attacking with pure viciousness ‘Du Gudfryktige Orm’ is a song for the fodder the, ‘God Fearing Worms’ and there is no hiding place as it batters away with some creepy doom laden parts and dictatorial spoken words urging the troops to be cut down in a veritable hail of bullets. The dynamics here are as well executed as the fallen, the sense of pace and the strumming guitar sound is tight and powerful and as we go towards the dreadfully stygian psalm that is ‘Stille Som Stein’ the coldness and anti-humanist approach is really working its foul necromantic magic. I have no inkling of the recording process but it sounds excellent, a long mournful bass part on this song cutting through the rib-cage in search of the squishy organs inside. It obviously succeeds in its mission to as everything kind of spews up and explodes out in a mad messy bomb of noise. The punk laden bounce of ‘Lucifer’s Blod’ is particularly attention catching and the song contains both slow parts and complete barking lunacy with its speeds, never standing still for a second and keeping you well and truly on your toes.
I see no evidence of live shows and indeed the band’s official page has only been about for a year or so. There is plenty of depth and maturity here on this there debut suggesting that nothing is out of their reach. There’s even an injection of sombre Norse poeticism about ‘Sjelen I Brann’ further displaying a wealth of ideas and authenticity about their otherwise grim craft. Nattverd may have seemingly come out of nowhere but they definitely left a bloody mark here and as the last number contests I was more than happy to ‘Hill Satan’ along with them!
(7.5/10 Pete Woods)
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