Well, this was a nice surprise. I was quite fond of “In the Woods”, and to my very great surprise, Nattehimmel features not only the Botteri brothers, but also James Fogarty on vocals. Even if you’ve not heard In The Woods, you may have heard James in other bands such as Ewigkeit and Jaldaboath. All of this pedigree is for nought of course, if the new band turns out to be dreadful.
Nattehimmel are an extreme metal band that clearly have roots in black metal, but to call them a black metal band would be a stretch too far. For the most part, this is an album of spacey, fairly progressive extremity that has a little more to do with the latter period of Bathory than the earlier works. Doomy, deliberate riffs piling over tasteful synth washes and almost choral clean singing.
It’s with songs like, “Each Man A Constellation” that the music is perhaps at the most bombastic. Yes, there are elements of (particularly) late 90’s black metal to be found here with the frantic guitar work, the harsh almost shrieked vocals, but there are also soaring, almost Emperor like clean sections that add huge amounts of character to proceedings. This is not a band that wants to go through the motions – more an outfit that carries the experience and vision to deliver the music they want to make.
The album has plenty of pacier sections, though to my ears Nattehimmel come into their own when they slow things down. Tracks such as “Mountain of the Northern Kings” wouldn’t necessarily sound out of place on, say, a Candlemass album. Doom but done in a progressive, cosmic way? Sounds tasty doesn’t it? It is.
There’s not much in the way of negative feedback to give, in fairness. I would say that on occasion the synth in particular does make it sound a little too late 90’s – fine if you like that kind of thing, but might have been better with either a more modern sound, or at least on occasion be turned down a little in the mix, as I have occasionally found myself frustrated at how much prominence it has. It’s not bad, but it is fair to say that constant washes can overwhelm the guitars at times.
All in all though, if you were a fan of In The Woods works such as their classic ’97 album “Omnio”, you’re going to find this a really pleasing logical progression. For the rest of us, it’s a good album on its own terms.
(8/10 Chris Davison)
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