Seemingly existing only as pertaining to the album title, the word ‘Nightfloating’ seems an easy enough one to deduce. Unless I am completely mistaken it is the liminal state of being where one is crossing the path between wakefulness and sleep. It is at this point where you begin to drift off that things become disorientating and even hallucinatory as you ‘float’ towards the void of dreams, where practically anything can happen. Being that it is being presented here as the 11th album and marking 25 years of cult Italian act Forgotten Tomb, one should not be surprised that these six dreams are more akin to musical nightmares. The band are not known for projecting happy visions on their listeners and those expecting a ‘Safe Place’ here are certainly in the wrong neighbourhood. The fantastic artwork by Greek artist Satta La Main Verte should give you a clue as to what sort of visions are to be found in the crumbling ruins of the music and so too should the lyrics of the title track where we “float through the waves of the night” life is swallowed and we “cease to exist.”
Having thrown a curveball in the form of progressive orientated title track on last album Nihilistic Estrangement’ one is probably wondering if things are going to continue down this path. On the whole though the new album seems to present a snapshot of the band’s career with many recognisable tropes on the first four tracks before things go somewhat off grid on the remaining couple. ‘Nightfloating’ takes off with a roar not a snore, with the coarse rasps of Herr Morbid coating the melodious strains of the music as we settle down to a rugged and distempered slumber. Breaking things down with a simple but lush passage of guitar work we get the chance to drift dreamily for a moment and really take in the gorgeous tones of the production here. With plenty of blackened surges and gothic sounding tones to compliment them we enter the domain of what is meant to be restful but somehow never is. Sleep kind of turns one into a castaway and that is the poetic theme of single ‘A Chill That You Can’t Taint’ and the “atrocities of daylight” are fully laid to rest… Enter a domain of intricate meandering bass and thorny, thick guitar-work which is allowed to peel out an exuberant solo as it wraps itself around us. There’s that signature expression of DSBM embedded within the number and a piano keyboard part too as it downs tools. Vocal disgust and discourse plunges us headlong into the embittered sounding ‘This Sickness Withered My Heart’ but there are also some near romantic vibes cast within the otherwise tempestuous and tormented blackness of the number as well as plenty of groove along with elongated growls from the frontman.
Momentarily waking up and feeling feverish one has time to flip the pillow over to the second side and hope that its coolness will soothe. Not much chance of that as ‘Safe Spaces’ injects a rotten, rolling rhythm and bounces up and down on chest like a constricting demon ushering into a patch of sleep paralysis. Sleep should never be considered safe, after all it’s the dreadful hours in the early morning when the spectre of death is most likely to visit. If so what better way to confront your last breath than to a soundtrack of dungeon-synth? It’s with next track ‘Drifting’ we find ourselves somewhat unexpectedly encountering this. A classic sounding and almost Teutonic piece of nostalgia which although disruptive to the musical flow, somehow naturally fits in. Perhaps the last track’s title “A Despicable Gift’ is surfacing again having escaped the grasp of death to the cold light of day once more? It’s no quick rising though as the 11-minute epic gets down and boogies with some trademark sludge and Southern sounding grooves which are enough to have us trying to clasp bedding around us and toss and turn, waking eventually feeling totally drained, agitated and hopeless.
Forgotten Tomb have presented a Byronic form of Darkness here and the more you listen the more it will haunt your wakeful hours and perhaps follow you into the numb void of sleep. Be prepared, after all, we float through the dark hours of the night together.
(8/10 Pete Woods)
Leave a Reply