AN NCS PREMIERE: NATVRE’S — “ENDLESS”

 

As all lovers of extreme metal are well aware, Greece is home to some of the planet’s most powerful and distinctive black metal bands. As the years have passed, the “classic Hellenic sound” of the early and mid-’90s has morphed and expanded in a multitude of directions, reflecting the still-vibrant creativity at work in the Greek underground. NATVRE’S is one of the newer exponents of black metal from Greece who have managed to establish their own distinctive style within their homeland’s traditions of burning black ferocity.

NATVRE’S are based in Thessaloniki, and they self-released their debut album Wrath in 2015. The copies disappeared quickly, selling out in just a few months. But the Dutch label Argento Records knew a good thing when they heard it and are now primed to re-issue Wrath in a 3-panel digisleeve CD edition with enhanced artwork. We’ve written about one advance song from the album already (“Lazarines“), and today we get to bring you the premiere of another savagely crushing track, this one named “Endless“.

 

 

The first thing you’ll undoubtedly notice about this song, which is a key component of NATVRE’S‘ terrorizing strategy, is the sheer immensity of the sound — the enormous, sludgy, earthshaking quality of the foundational bass and guitar riffs, which is atypical in most variants of black metal. The staggering weight of the song and the hard-punching and somersaulting drum rhythms will get your head moving, and that compulsion only grows stronger when the song settles into a grooving back-beat (NATVRE’s propensity to rock seems as ingrained and their desire to smash everything to dust).

But that’s only one ingredient in the music, even if it’s the one most likely to crack your skull open. There’s a needling lead-guitar arpeggio that also surfaces early in the track. It’s a demented and poisonous little demon, but it becomes increasingly seductive the more you hear it, and as the song progresses and the huge grooves become increasingly destructive, the guitar work grows even more skin-flaying and intense.

One final distinctive ingredient is worth mentioning, though it’s not as if you’ll overlook it: The vocals are insane enough to give you the shivers — a cacophony of wretched, vile growls, demonic shrieks, deranged yells, and solemn chants.

The combination of all these ingredients makes a big impression, as does the album as a whole. And if you like what you hear, you’ll be pleased to know that NATVRE’S are at work on a new album that Argento will be releasing sometime in 2017.

 

To pre-order Wrath from Argento Records, go here:

http://argentorecords.bigcartel.com/product/natvre-s-wrath-digisleeve-cd-pre-order
https://natvresbm.bandcamp.com/album/wrath

Two other songs from the album have premiered previously — “Prototype” and “Lazarine” — and you can listen to both of them below, along with “Endless”.

NATVRE’S on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/natvres/