AN NCS PREMIERE: NIGHTBRINGER — “MISRULE”

 

Over the course of four albums and a handful of split releases since 2001, Nightbringer have established such a prominent presence in the shadow realms of arcane black metal that every new release must now be regarded as an Event, with a capital E. Their fifth full-length is named Terra Damnata, and it’s scheduled to appear via Season of Mist on April 14. We’ve previously praised the first single from the album, “Serpent Sun“, and now it’s our privilege to help premiere the second one — a track named “Misrule“.

Nightbringer described “Serpent Sun” as the “theme for a god, solar soliloquy, incubated to rise for the fall.” That song is a barn-burner — fiery, immense, dramatic, casting an aura of ominous and savage majesty. The sweeping keyboards and sparkling guitar melody are as gripping as the giant boom of the drums and the wild ferocity of the vocals. It’s enough to make normal humans cower like mice beneath the swooping shadow of a great raptor overhead. The newest song also takes no prisoners.

 

 

“Misrule” is both thunderous and mystical, a manifestation of ecstasy and triumph, an orgy of ferocity and a spellbinding revelation.

The music’s vaulting keyboard ambience gives the song an atmosphere of apocalyptic grandeur, but it is also mercilessly barbaric, the maniacal lead guitars and high, incinerating shrieks creating a sense of fiery chaos, with the drums propelling this intense surge of power at a blistering speed. When the frenzy does relent, as the drum rhythm moves to the pace of a processional and then generates the calamitous sound of isolated thunder strikes, the band use a strange dual guitar harmony to cast a dark, twisted, and disorienting spell.

Nightbringer has previously explained that the eight tracks on the album are “eight aspects of a sorcerous path that shines like dreadful starlight in the long night of the close of the Kali Yuga.” And of this new song in particular, the band tell us what it represents within this conception: “The revelation of the daemon arises at the cross roads where all opposites meet. In the eternal instant at the point of paradox the gnosis of the Horned Lord of Misrule is revealed.”

Nightbringer’s music is the result of spiritual inspiration, a manifestation and realization of their faith. The vitality of the sound seems inextricably linked to these sources, regardless of whether the listener shares or even understands where it comes from. But that dark fire burns damned brightly in these songs for all to hear.

 

 

The participants in Terra Damnata are as follows:

Naas Alcameth – vocals, lyrics, guitar
VJS – guitar
Norgaath – bass
Menthor – Drums |
Ophis – vocals, lyrics, guitar
ar Ra’d al Iblis – vocals, lyrics

The album is ornamented by the distinctive cover art of David Herrerias. It was recorded with Dave Otero (Cobalt, Cephalic Carnage, Cattle Decapitation, Archspire). The album is available for order in a variety of formats at this location:

http://smarturl.it/NightbringerDamnata

The full track list is below, followed by useful links and streams of both “Misrule” and “Serpent Sun“.

1. As Wolves Amongst Ruins
2. Misrule
3. Midnight’s Crown
4. Of the Key and Crossed Bones
5. Let Silence be His Sacred Name
6. Inheritor of a Dying World
7. The Lamp of Inverse Light
8. Serpent Sun

Nightbringer:
https://www.facebook.com/NightbringerOfficial

Season Of Mist:
http://www.season-of-mist.com
https://www.facebook.com/seasonofmistofficial