Shub-Niggurath
Les Morts Vont Vite

Shub-Nigurrath is a name that all Lovecraft fans know very well. Indeed, it is a figure that plays an important role within the mythology created by the Providence writer; it is the shapeless goddess of fertility who appears to men and copulates with them in the form of a black goat; she is the Great Mother, wife and progenitor of the omnipotent Yog Sothoth, "he who must not be named."

"Les Morts Vont Vite" instead is a line from the "Ballade de Lenore", a ballad written by the German Burger in the midst of Sturm und Drang that tells the sad story of a maiden, Lenore, desperate because her fiancé Wilhelm has not yet returned from the war, who receives an unexpected nighttime visit from a knight in armor. The horseman tells her that he is her betrothed and takes her away with him. The two ride at a gallop through desolate moors until they reach an old abandoned cemetery, where the tragedy unfolds. Lenore, struck by suspicion, lifts the visor of the soldier's helmet and sees the fleshless face of a specter. Her heart cannot withstand the indescribable fright and stops, while the ghostly knight and his black steed disappear into the night.

Burger's ballad is the typical Gothic drama where Eros and Thanatos blend together, but this time it is death that mocks love and, taking Lenore away, takes its revenge on life.

From these premises, it is already clear that the musical proposal of this French group in their second album (1986) will probably be characterized by unsettling sounds.

Indeed, that's exactly how it is; the music of Shub-Nigurrath is gloomy and dark to the core, their tracks consist of slow and heavy sepulchral litanies that suddenly transform into infernal sound rides where all instruments alternate and intersect. Ominous and obsessive bass and drums dictate the rhythm, grave and funereal chords of piano and church organ become handfuls of fierce and hysterical notes, the trombone draws disorienting arabesques that blend with the noise of a perverse and distorted guitar.

Above all dominates the possessed voice of soprano Ann Stewart who sings as if she were the priestess in trance of a blasphemous and cruel god.

There is no trace of melody, there is no glimmer of light or drop of life; the entire work, pervaded by a sense of anguish and oppression, is a gloomy celebration of death's triumph.

Obviously, an album as peculiar as this cannot be accessible to everyone. It will probably appeal to lovers of contemporary classical music and avant-garde progressive groups like Magma, Univers Zero, and Amon Duul of "Phallus Dei," or to followers of the Great Cthulhu while chanting the unnameable verses of the Necronomicon during a full moon night.

After "Les Morts Vont Vite," Shub-Niggurath will still release a handful of albums (the last one being "Testament" in 2003) and then disappear into nowhere. They probably all lead a normal life far from the spotlight today or perhaps are slaves of the Great Mother who, to reward them for their devotion, wanted them with her in her underground sanctuary beneath the City of Pillars.

And there, along with a virtuoso violinist, a certain Erich Zann, they play and sing for her and her spouse day and night, watched for eternity by her thousand offspring.

Yog Sothoth! Yog Sothoth! Yog Sothoth! (from the track "Yog Sothoth")