Current 93
Nature Unveiled

THE REVIEW

“Nature Unveiled” (1984) remains, over time, a surreal and esoteric nightmare of mystical and satanic power. David Tibet has always been a figure of many interests, rightfully fitting into the gallery of eccentric English artists: at the time, he was obsessed with Aleister Crowley and “The Songs of Maldoror” by Lautréamont, a decadent and excessive work akin to the Marquis De Sade. Later, he would continue to be interested in decadent writers and the supernatural, such as Arthur Machen, Thomas Ligotti (with whom he would collaborate), and Eric Count Stenbock. But the dark aesthetic of his gothic and horrific vein is already well present here. Influenced by Throbbing Gristle, Tibet undertakes a collage operation in his own ingenious way: he originally combines Gregorian chants and industrial-style noise, creating a powerful, sulfurous, and satanic atmosphere that, even today, remains something unmatched.

“Nature Unveiled” is composed of 2 suites: the first is the devastating Ach Golgotha (Maldoror Is Dead), a true symphony of terror, dark and occult: from the boiling magma of piano loops and noises emerges overwhelmingly the incredible voice of David Tibet, comparable to the early experiments of Diamanda Galas. The words obsessively recited by Tibet “Maldoror Is Dead” seem truly capable of evoking the specter of Lautréamont. There is the vivid sensation of entering inaccessible Dantean infernal circles where it is possible to witness rituals of death and perdition officiated by dark Demons. Tibet manages with few means to create an apocalyptic and quasi-religious atmosphere of a Universal Judgment. No one before had ventured so far.

The subsequent “The Mystical Body Of Christ In Chorazaim (The Great In The Small)” begins in a calmer way with unsettling settings that evoke an exorcism conducted by a priest in mystical crisis in some lost monastery in Asia. The atmosphere remains, in any case, unsettling: the distorted Gregorian chants fit perfectly into the nightmarish context, suggesting a kind of inverted religion. The finale is dominated by loops of voices and noises that then dissolve into a sort of cosmic void.

After “Nature Unveiled” it will rightly be referred to as esoteric-industrial to define this (anti)music. The record will from that moment on become very influential for a whole series of artists: suffice it to mention the Italians Sigillum S, initially devout followers of the Current, or the Romans Ain Soph who, in their own way, embarked on a similar path at the beginning.