Blut Aus Nord
Ultima Thulee

A couple of nights ago I went to pick up a friend of mine in my car, who has been lost in Black Metal for years. He asked me to wait a moment because he wanted to grab a record to make me listen to: to convince me, he was lavish in praise of this Blut Aus Nord, a solo project that had never really interested me much given its label of "Industrial Black Metal". However, I let him do it; I believe that if I had insisted on leaving immediately, I would have lost the chance to add a record to my Black favorites.

Blut Aus Nord (despite the name being in German) is a French one-man band, debuting in 1995 precisely with this CD; it seems strange that this work is from so many years ago. Given the great dose of innovation still valid in 2007. My friend kept defining it as a "cold" album, and although at first, I secretly wondered how a French artist could be so "cold" (I know, I have a narrow mind), it took only a few minutes of music to convince me that it was "cold" indeed. Not only that, it was also damn anguishing and melancholic.

If I had to cite influences, I would definitely mention Burzum's "Det Som Engang Var" and "Hvis Liset Tar Oss" (especially the latter), but I think that still doesn't quite capture the idea. The use of keyboards is better, often more accentuated (see "Rhstula", a track entirely performed with Synth) and certainly of greater artistic value. The influences of "good" Varg are felt also under the thematic profile, exclusively concerning Nordic mythology, which however is only hinted at in the titles (the lyrics are not there) and in the artwork (beautiful photos of snow-capped peaks).

As I was saying, Blut Aus Nord's work only has some Burzumian veins but otherwise is forged in a completely autonomous and personal manner. The production is very strange; at times dirty as Black tradition dictates, at other times clean and glacial (especially in the guitar arpeggios, in the choruses, in the keyboard interludes). And on the other hand, there's no surprise, the production merely caters to the needs of the riffing, which constantly changes its skin and from epic becomes desperate and then unleashes with a typically Black fury. Note that the mixing does not penalize the bass tones at all, which add depth and weight to the sound of the record. But it is such an offense to provide technical details on this CD.

Decadent, proud, dreamlike; a run in a snowy field, falling, breathing with difficulty. Then stop lying on your back to stare at the pale winter sky. Feel the cold on your back and the sweat in your hair. Stop to look around and let yourself be looked at by what's around. Fear, hopes extinguishing, tears of rage.

The road I was driving on had become hallucinating; all the roads we drove on became hallucinating and filled with old, ugly memories. Of all those bad memories I've gone through and now seem like scars to show off with pride. This is what I was thinking on the car seat. I break the silence to communicate it to my friend, and he confirms. The guitar arpeggios, full of reverb, were moving away from the car stereo like circles on the water when you throw a stone. And they shook me just as those circles ripple the water. Everyone in their life has gone through something Blut Aus Nord describes so well in its CD. A feeling of emptiness, a feeling found (more sinister and sick) only in some works of Striborg; "Ultima Thulee" is finding yourself with nothing in hand but memories. It's reviewing your life in the heavily filtered screams of the singer. It's remembering beautiful and tragic moments in a renewed despair. The riffs talk about defeats, and to be honest, they bring a lump to my throat; even when they are energetic, they always represent the last attack of a dying beast, the most dangerous one, which whatever its outcome, will always end with its own death. "Ultima Thulee" is icy, smooth like a slab of ice, sharp like broken ice, and like ice, it can leave bad burns on the skin. It lacks that repetitiveness that in Burzum made things more linear, almost mathematical. It lacks that self-destructive madness of Abyssic Hate or Nyktalgia, which resolves in an hour of suicidal manias; the subversive effect of this record lasts numerous hours.

Honestly, it has nothing industrial if not the name; there is nothing less "synthetic" than this record; in any case, it remains a product not recommended to fans of Dark Funeral, Dimmu Borgir, and Marduk. Honestly, I can't find many more words to say other than that this work disturbed me a lot, it put a dazzling order in all my failures, now easily consultable and in full view. A record to approach either if you've always had a beautiful life or if you've overcome every problem; if you need to counter, do it after listening to "Rigsthula".