AN NCS INTERVIEW: DOWNFALL OF NUR (ANTONIO SANNA)

 Interviews  4 Responses »
Nov 182015
 

Downfall of Nur-5

 

(Argentinian journalist Matías Gallardo rejoins us with this interview of Antonio Sanna, the man behind Downfall of Nur, whose fine debut album Umbras de Barbagia was released earlier this year.)

The year is coming to an end and the black metal scene has many things to toast to. One of them is the appearance of Downfall of Nur, the one man band from an Italian-Argentinian multi-instrumentalist named Antonio Sanna. Hailing originally from the land of Sardinia, Italy, Antonio moved to Argentina as a kid, and now at only 19 years old he has become one of the more interesting faces in the genre. Mixing the raw and classic sound of Scandinavian black metal whilst identifying himself with the Cascadian sound of masters like Wolves in the Throne Room and the folk influence of giants Agalloch, he released Umbras de Barbagia, one of the most exciting debuts of the year. In this interview, Antonio talks about the beginnings of the band and how much his indivisible emotional link with his homeland remains as the key influence in his music.

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Before Downfall of Nur you played in projects like Dreon, Drowned in November, Funeralopolis, and Philosophie des Toren. What can you tell me about them and how different were they from DON?

They were all experimental projects, stages where I was interested in a musical style/genre and in recording something associated with it. Funeralopolis was the previous name of Philosophie des Toren, and then I changed it. I can´t remember why, it was a long time ago, anyway. None of them were serious projects. The project that may have been a bit more serious was Drowned in November. I’ve learned a lot thanks to the recording process of those projects, but they never had any other purpose than to experiment. DON was created with the idea of making a serious project, and beyond an experiment in sound and composition, although keeping some parameters. Continue reading »

DOWNFALL OF NUR: “UMBRAS DE BARBAGIA”

 Album Reviews  10 Responses »
Apr 302015
 

 

(Andy Synn reviews the debut album of Argentina’s Downfall of Nur.)

Every year I hope that there’s going to be an album/EP/artist in general that becomes the year’s big discovery, not just for me, but for our readers here at NCS.

Previously I’ve directed your attention to bands like Amiensus, Khonsu, and Ion (and I’m more than willing to take credit for Hellish Outcast as well), while other writers here have in turn uncovered such amazing bands as Progenie Terrestre Pura and Wildernessking, which have gone on to become not only personal favourites of mine, but well-deserved favourites of this site and its community as a whole.

And although I thought I’d already stumbled upon this year’s entry when I came across the debut EP by Exgenesis (reviewed here) there’s no rule saying that a year can’t have more than one big surprise up its sleeve.

Which, of course, leads us to Umbras de Barbagia by Downfall of Nur. Continue reading »

POLITICS?

 Mosh Pit  40 Responses »
Feb 212015
 

 

(An old subject, and probably not much new to say about it. I get like this when I’ve had too much to drink. At least there’s some good metal at the end.)

We’re not an overtly political site. I emphasize the word “overtly”, because if you’ve been paying attention, you can probably figure out that we have our views, and they influence what we write and what we write about.

But it’s not the result of any kind of editorial edict. We all write what we want to write about. There are no assignments here, there are no litmus tests. Maybe that’s a strength, maybe that’s a weakness. But somehow, I think we do have a basic world view, one that all the writers subscribe to. It’s a minimalist communion, because we are far from clones of each other. The only communion is the worship of art. Our goddess is The Muse, our god is Pan. Except, those are metaphors — we have no god in what we do here, we praise the achievement of human inspiration and talent.

Up to a point. For many music fans it’s impossible to separate the creator from the creation. And to varying degrees, we have trouble doing that, too. Ninety-nine percent of the time, it’s not an issue — 99% of the time we don’t really know what bands believe, and 99% of the time their music isn’t dedicated to any controversial philosophies. Resistance to authority, rebellion against the imposition of structure by people who mean nothing to you, revulsion against religious dogma — those really aren’t radical views, and they’re increasingly less marginal, even in society as a whole. That view of the world might be a revelation to 18-year-old’s, but it’s old hat to most 40-year-old’s. It means very little in judgments about the quality of metal. Continue reading »