Could it really be three years since the last Inferno Festival? The last instalment had been in 2019 and of course COVID had intervened for 2020 and 2021, but at last it was time for the Inferno faithful to descend upon Oslo for one of the best festivals out there. Inferno is about more than just four days of some the best extreme music, it is about a community of like-minded metalheads gathering at the luxurious Clarion hotel for the period of the festival. The hotel is covered in festival posters and blasts metal over its PA for the duration, with black clad hordes happily rubbing shoulders with bemused looking families holidaying in Oslo over the Easter break. Despite the culture clash, there is absolutely no animosity or tension and there is a party atmosphere throughout the whole weekend.


As well as the music, there were walking tours, beer tastings, Munch tours, signing sessions, tattoo artists, an art exhibition, a film festival and of course the Inferno Music Conference which included a drum clinic with Daray from Dimmu Borgir and the famous Metal Auction as well as numerous seminars. There were also matinee bands across a few venues in the city before the doors opened at the main venue. This meant that choices had to be made as it simply wasn’t possible to do or see everything. Of course, that’s a good problem to have!

My Thursday began with a trip to the legendary Neseblod record store. I have written about this a lot in previous reviews of Inferno so I won’t go into detail too much here, except to say that if you are a black metal fan in Oslo, you simply must visit. Not only does it have a HUGE amount of vinyl, CD, tapes and shirts for sale (many genuine rarities) it is the closest thing to a black metal museum with many test and first pressings from the early days of Norwegian black metal on display and of course the basement with the infamous “Black Metal” wall. From Neseblod, I headed to Katakomben records – My pledge to buy less vinyl this year was already not going well!

After dumping my purchases back at the hotel, I headed up to Vaterland for the matinee bands. Vaterland is a great pizza and beer establishment with a room upstairs that hosts bands, and although it gets very busy, very quickly it is a great little venue.

Danish Death metal outfit Livløs were up first and with the band tightly packed on the small stage, they launched into ‘Drenched in Turmoil’. At times they came across as melodic death metal, while at others they sounded more like old school, straight up death metal.

They were given a rapturous reception by the crowd before a big pit opened and then a wall of death (impressive for a venue of this size!).

‘Serpentine Supremacy’ and ‘Pallbearer’ flew by before the vocalist left the stage to sing from the mosh pit during final track ‘Seize the Night’. Very impressive.

Next up were German melodic death metallers Hiraes who were playing in support of their debut album ‘Solitary’. Hiraes rose from the ashes of Dawn of Disease, with the same members except new vocalist, Britta Görtz.

There was an air of excitement and expectation as they took to the stage opening with ‘Shadows Break’ and ‘Under Fire’. The room became stiflingly hot as the band ripped through ’Grain of Sand’ and ‘1000 Lights’ meaning the first half of their debut had been played in order.

The set was closed out with ‘Solitary’ and ‘Running Out of Time’. It was clear that Britta is a huge talent, complementing the rest of the band well and it would not surprise me to see this band gracing much bigger stages soon.

I headed from Vaterland to the main venue, the Rockefeller and John Dee complex. For the uninitiated, these two venues are in the same building, connected by a stair case. Rockefeller is the main stage with a capacity of about 1350 and John Dee is the smaller stage with a capacity of about 400. The bands alternate between the two stages meaning that it is theoretically possible to see every minute of every band, but the reality is that John Dee reaches capacity very quickly for most bands, necessitating a one in, one out policy, and so I usually left the Rockefeller stage a few minutes early to ensure a spot in John Dee.

The main festival opened with Norwegian hard/alternative rockers Djerv. Perhaps not a typical Inferno band, but they were perfect to get the party started with their catchy yet aggressive anthems.

Agnete Kjølsrud was the consummate front woman, prowling the stage, initially with her hair piled up in horns, then in a net, then down and even throwing in a cigar for full effect.

Perhaps the standout track from me was a mesmerising rendition of ‘Throne’ and they went down well with the decent sized crowd who had arrived early.

In complete contrast, France’s Regarde Les Hommes Tomber followed on the John Dee stage and were one of my “must see” bands of the festival and they didn’t disappoint. The band were mostly backlit, appearing as silhouettes only as they launched into ‘L’Ascension’ and preceded to deliver a masterclass in epic, atmospheric black metal.

‘A New Order’ and ‘The Renegade Sun’ flew past before ‘Stellar Cross’. The packed crowd was transfixed by this performance, finely balancing a crushing density with sublime melodies.

As far as I can recall, ‘The Incandescent March’ was the only track not from the latest album before ’Au Bord du Gouffre’ closed the set and I confidently declared to anyone that would listen, that we had just seen the band of the festival.

Legendary band Cadaver followed upstairs in the Rockefeller room. As I’m sure most will be aware, Cadaver were one of the first Norwegian death metal bands having founded back in the 80s only to split in 1993.

Founder member Anders Odden (also of Order and Satyricon) pulled the band back together in 1999, initially as Cadaver inc, but more recently back to Cadaver. Despite the legendary status and obvious pedigree of their members, I was expecting a fairly standard death metal set and was not prepared for what was going to be unleashed.

I was completely blown away by the intensity of their set as Anders was joined by a plague mask wearing double bassist and Dirk Verbeulen on drums.

Between them they delivered a set of battering, ferocious old school death metal including crowd favourite ‘D. G. A. F.’. True Norwegian Death Metal indeed!

Danish death doom metallers Konvent arrived at Inferno with a rapidly growing reputation and I was looking forward to catching them live.

They opened with ‘In the Soot’ from the recently released ‘Call Down the Sun Album’ and their oppressive doomy tomes were soon hypnotising the John Dee crowd as ‘Grains’ and ‘Fantamorgana’ flew by.

Rikke’s vocals were guttural and crushing and before long she had dived onto the crowd. By the time ‘Squares’, from the demo, was closing the set, they had won over a lot of new friends and had proven that their rapidly growing reputation is well deserved.

By this time, I was in the mood for some more traditional black metal and who better than Norwegian stalwarts Kampfar.

I have seen them numerous times and they never disappoint – Inferno was no exception. They unleashed a barrage of abrasive black metal anthems, mixing new tracks with old favourites which were all well received by the Rockefeller mosh pit.

Flaming torches added to the atmosphere as Dolk stirred up the baying crowd with one track leading into another. There was no finesse, this was no nonsense black metal and the crowd loved it!

Having had my need for some aggression satisfied, I headed downstairs early to secure a spot for Sylvaine, another of my “must see” acts. I could see that I wasn’t alone, as a big crowd had already gathered, ready for the talented multi-instrumentalist and her band.

Opening with ‘Nova’, Sylvaine’s vocals were simply stunning and the entire crowd stood, mesmerised. ‘Delusions’ took us back to the ‘Wistful’ album before ‘Mono No Aware’ and ‘Nowhere, Still Somewhere’ returned us to ‘Nova’ with a sublime display of atmospheric metal. ‘Earthbound’ returned us to ‘Wistful’ before ‘Mørklagt’ closed the set.

Of course, a lot of the vocals are ethereal and sublime, but just as compelling were the harsh, howling vocal screams that contrast really effectively with the more serene passages. Simple stunning!

Ihsahn surely requires no introduction to Ave Noctum readers, perhaps best known for his role with Emperor, but also having now released a large body of solo work, most recently the well-received ‘Telemark’ and ‘Pharos’ EPs.

The crowd was inexplicably smaller than it had been for previous bands, as Ihsahn and his band launched into their set comprising black metal passages (such as on ‘Nord’), prog extreme metal (such as ‘Frozen Lakes on Mars’) and even a cover of Iron Maiden’s ‘Wrathchild’ (covered on the ‘Telemark’ EP) which was possibly the highlight of the set for me.

However, I’m not sure what it was, but something didn’t sound quite right and judging by the ever-depleting crowd I wasn’t the only person to think so. This was a real shame as Ihsahn can be a real force to be reckoned with and is an artist I hold in the highest regard.

Downstairs, Swiss duo Bölzer were shaking the foundations of John Dee with their dissonant, black metal and although they may be something of an acquired taste, the Inferno crowd are connoisseurs and had no problem appreciating the dense wall of noise.

All too soon their set was closing with ‘CME’ meaning it was time to dash back upstairs for tonight’s headlining act.

Back in 1982, Tom G. Warrior (perhaps best known for his roles with Celtic Frost and Triptykon) started a band called Hellhammer. After a couple of years, a few demos, an EP and a couple of songs on a compilation album, the band disbanded, never to be reformed.

However Tom G Warrior wanted to perform the music live and so Triumph of Death was formed. Taking to the stage with his trademark make up, he looked thrilled to be performing these tracks. The set was almost exclusively Hellhammer tracks, with one Celtic Frost track thrown in for good measure (‘Visions of Mortality’ if I recall correctly).

‘Maniac’, ‘Blood Insanity and ‘Messiah’ were highlights before the set was closed appropriately with ‘Triumph of Death’, leaving the satisfied crowd to head out and explore Oslo’s bars.

(Review and Photos Andy Pountney @shot_in_the_dark_photography)

Part 3 Here