Ulterior second wave vibrancy, an industrial metal detonation and today’s avant-garde shamanic delve all manifest as the same search for meaning by a thousand clawing hands, funneled through a few gratefully burdened minds. As we reach for contextual guidance beneath the pinging ~70 minute plethora that is ‘Black Medium Current‘ today we can cut to the chase in the sense that quality outmodes quantity, though quantity is nonetheless overflowing from the mouth of this latest feat. None of our exploration of Dødheimsgard past-and-present will suit a narrow-minded taster, especially as we approach in retrospect and attempt to waltz alongside this fresh gateway unto a near completed third decade of activity. Each release beyond their first represents some manner of drastic stylistic venture, plenty of notable line-up changes, and a need to express something bigger than the self yet only the final third of those observations should not become peripheral as we gather thoughts on what this entity is, what motivates their work, and where the journey takes us nearly ten years beyond their last escalation.

If there is any evidence left unconsidered that might bolster the argument that black metal was feasibly counter cultural prior to its commercialization in the mid-90’s the best, or, most enduring source comes from the estranged personalities it’d nurtured into form per the “original” underground movement spearheaded by fanatic suburban teenagers. As black metal pioneership claws uneasily toward retirement age we can increasingly side-step most popular still-active musician’s thoughts on the past as a sometimes unreliable source for information per our age of naked, aggressive opportunism and instead look to their greater bodies of work beyond the “second wave” as to what mindset endured as further adaptation. Point A: Dødheimsgard‘s work speaks for itself as mindset perpetually in a state of unease with permanence and the complicity of stagnancy. Staying true to the original defiance is valid for some, placing stake upon the land as territorially wetted arena which is perpetually commercially viable by way of historic valuation and well-farmed nostalgia… is only admirable if it is for the sake of documentation. Others, and I’d say the bulk of the Oslo, Norway-borne black metal auteurs in particular, eventually turned to progressive rock influenced metal as the only feasible container for the freedom of expression black metal had implied as a brand new medium in their youth. When the amorphous philosophy of black metal freed itself of religion, freed itself of hard rock music sub-genre fiction and began to view fellowship as little more than incestuous plagiarism among peers (back when a living could be made, eh) most sought an enduring vessel for creative freedom through pronounced idiosyncrasy that’d match personal philosophies — Black metal naturally became increasingly separate in tangent, impossible to contain and for many a false reality. Point B: Dødheimsgard‘s work spoke to this disillusionment with nihilistic idealism, and moved on, over two decades ago.

Granted many black metal to progressive metal transformations were set into place per the clear commercial valuation available to their aging fandom but, when we begin to turn our great burning eye towards Dødheimsgard’s curious legacy we find a golden spiral of a left hand path, wherein quick-turning away from fixation of style (eventually) left their reputation permeant, increasingly broad-minded to the point that it were (eventually) labeled “progressive” and “avant-garde” for a lack of appropriate signifiers available to the scope of their vision, particularly as we step into the new millennium and arrive at their Satanic airport of sorts. That is to say that many primarily know this group for one of two reasons: They are “that one band Fenriz played bass in for a minute” or an influential act in the more serious pursuit of industrial metal applications to black metal. Both are important artefacts of second-era black metal as dogmatic paradigm at its frothing head (‘Kronet til konge‘, 1995) and at its most clear point of decline into extreme spectacle as commercial art (‘Satanic Art‘, 1999) and at the very least anyone approaching ‘Black Medium Current‘ should fundamentally understand where this band came from through these two releases in particular as they embody where Aldrahn (Urarv, Thorns) and Vicotnik (Dold Vorde Ens Navn, Ved Buens Ende) initially saw eye to eye, then back-to-back and eventually as separate visionaries. Change was necessary for growth, personalities evolved together and apart as Point A is made.

For our purposes today we must push past these thrilling, juiciest points of provenance in the 90’s towards the point where most would suggest Vicotnik‘s vision officially became the main driver for Dødheimsgard with the inspired and profound for its time ‘666 International‘ (1999) which’d made good on the not unheard of but still surprising style introduced on the ‘Satanic Art‘ EP; No need to oversell the idea of industrial black metal in hindsight. It was a new realm of possibility for the group and a new voice entirely which broadened their reach and defined what Dødheimsgard would be remembered for within a longer list of talking points. At the time over the top programmed drums and industrial rock tangents (see: ‘Supervillain Outcast‘, 2007) weren’t unheard of but rarely done well. I’d personally discovered this band through recommendations per my high enthusiasm for ‘Channeling the Quintessence of Satan‘ and the first two Aborym records wherein ‘666 International‘ heavily informed expectations going forward and backward in time and I’d always felt the Kvohst (Grave Pleasures, ex-Code) lead fourth album from the band aged quite well as an outlandish 90’s Killing Joke inspired record. Electronic music’s strong contrast with the organic harass of extreme metal would continue to be part of Vicotnik‘s oeuvre going forward but, again, none of this factors into what ‘Black Medium Current‘ is today. Point B is less lucid in exploration, but even at face value the emerging eclectic, avant-garde spirit of the band had found its voice within a different medium.

All is recontextualized somewhere between the brief return of Aldrahn for album number five (‘A Umbra Omega‘, 2015) where we inevitably begin to see the maturation of each musician in their craft, the still future-sighted and endlessly yearning search of the artist in a short period of simpatico, and music gave us something new in a time of great nostalgic reversion for extreme metal in general. That’d been the groundwork set in some sense to begin viewing Dødheimsgard as an ‘legacy’ era black metal act that’d never gotten stuck on being a “brand” or a commodity as much as they’d managed to resound as an act with artistic merit, as evidenced by the rawly resonant self-production values, deeply detailed longform pieces and perhaps one of the most unhinged nigh Current 93 levels of vocal indulgence I’ve heard on a metal-adjacent album. No doubt we do not get a direct follow-up to ‘A Umbra Omega‘ for album number six but rather the first record from the band where Vicotnik‘s own voice is persistently leading the discourse for its entirety both in terms of lyrics and vocals.

Death is all I have, it is all I want, all I need. — If we can quickly identify the “what” here ‘Black Medium Current‘ is a decidedly atmospheric avant-garde black metal album with varietal influences upon both its exploratory philosophical statement and its indulgent rhythmic manifestation, each of which are entangled in purposeful harmony which communicates the labyrinth of the auteur’s mind palace. The lyrics bend between Norwegian, which is too stylized and referential for me to parse in the slightest, and English which goes quite a bit deeper beyond the fraught existentialism we’re typically faced with per black metal modernity. In fact the meta-statement to make here is perhaps that Dødheimsgard continue to manifest as modern music but not in the populist sense, music which reacts to the present day in perception and with a mind for what fresh Hell arrives in the spheres their consciousness ingests as taste. This allows for the conversation of the lyrics to manifest as sentient, an intelligent reaction to the strange yet exciting excess of suffering and confusion of our times. The major thesis, as parsed through press messaging mind you, is more stoic than it is nihilistic in suggesting that the limitation of hedonism is inevitable conflict with social and moral responsibility to others. Questioning the performative art of responsibility isn’t the only goal so much as grasping at the notion of free will as dependent upon the “work” of existence, states of despair and vexation which build intellectual endurance as the only path away from determinism within society. Self expression is tantamount to the individual and, generally speaking, the curative is art. No, there is no way to further reduce that thought without further twisting meaning and, yes, it is my own interpretation. Angst and vexation presented as necessities of sentience offer the primary colors used in creating the mood for ‘Black Medium Current‘ and these feats could be additionally qualified as surreal, simmering, yearning and fascinated states of mind in parsing the greater exercise in motion.

Of course the more obvious concern is that Dødheimsgard returning with a bit more guitar driven focus and Vicotnik on lead vocals might sound a bit like the somewhat nostalgic ‘uppance of Dold Vorde Ens Navn but while the haunt of his many ghostly forms is certainly felt here (see: “Requiem Aeternum”) that other project is by the hand of Haavard and the two rivers don’t mingle in any real sense. I will say that I was surprised at how distant, searching and spacious the affect of this album was to start. “Et Smelter” arrives with the deepest drag upon a black cigarette, an ember and only a small disturbance of light as the piece is exhaled into with pensive harmony and folken arpeggios dribbling about the loft of a subtle flute and a kick into what some might feel is almost a post-black metallic rush ~2:15 minutes in. I’d some sense to wonder if this’d be the pagan hymnal transformation for the artist but the opener is clearly a showcase for the thoughtfully despairing tone of the album and one to introduce the quite effective vocal reach of Vicotnik who impresses from the start. Don’t worry, things get eerie and wide-eyed wizarding rant eventually gives way to a tragedian chorale as the 10+ minute opener presses on. The dramatism of this piece as an opener is masterful and, I suppose at this point we cannot complain that this is immediately so different than anything Dødheimsgard had done before since that is basically the most key point to have gotten by now.

Of course I am most drawn to the dark and passionately irrational sort of realm we find “Interstellar Nexus” striking upon Side B already as this enormous double LP regularly shifts in tone about two pieces at a time. Elements of electronic rock and synth-driven psychedelic prog first emerge here, though they will eventually intensify as the patient listener soldiers beyond the hour mark towards main single “Abyss Perihelion Transit“, we do break into a late 90’s EDM style beat as the song breaches its last minute though this is eventually met with awkward blasts and chugging chords to play the moment out, if you are wondering how often emergent and ear-blurring moments will factor into the full listen. One of my favorite pieces on the album both lyrically and in terms of its deeper hooks, “It Does Not Follow”, more than completes the thought in black/prog-metal application which offers a finer tuned use of moderne black metal instrumentation beyond the ringing dissonance incorporated on ‘A Umbra Omega‘. Why does this type of thing appeal to me so readily yet a band like Enslaved are hit-or-miss for my taste? While that isn’t the most natural comparison from my point of view, this I can read and feel along with the performance which I’d enjoyed for its equally pronounced accessible and abstract qualities. In some sense this describes the appeal of Side C and D with the combination of “Det tomme kalde morke” and the aforementioned “Abyss Perihelion Transit” producing an entirely transfixing bulk of the album’s second half between the space ambient synth jam of the former and the radiation soaked future-sighted city lights of the latter.

The full listening experience of ‘Black Medium Current‘ is big, a lot to take in terms of its length and ambitious level of craft but this is not an impossibly involved and fiddled at prog-metal strike at technique so much as it is a realm ruled by expression, surrealistic mood-driven estrangement forever locked in a cycle of contemplation. You’re more likely going to walk away from these 70 minutes focused, relaxed by the dulcet ease of movement and Floydian range of theatre explored. There are heavier moments throughout but each of the longer form pieces here are intent on communicating a completely exploration of a thought and a feeling in a way which extreme metal rarely breaches beyond the visceral force needed to break through existential puzzlement, here the unraveling is guided by finesse and a search for what is genuine for the artist. Too outsized and ambitious to be considered accessible, too memorable and considered to be easily reduced by the flippant reductive sort there is a satisfyingly paradoxical register to ‘Black Medium Current‘ which suits the history and the future of Dødheimsgard well. A very high recommendation.

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