Published: August 22, 2020

Now this is black metal. Don’t take that as an endorsment of quality,

necessarily…just that if you’re putting Nubivagant on the same shelf as Ov Shadows, you’ll know instantly which one doesn’t belong.

Even so, this is pretty solid Swedish school black metal, not quite the empty pursuit of speed that is Norsecore, but still falling well within the sonic radar of bands that have at least dipped their toes into if not become infamous for their championing of said subgenre. Urgehal, Tsjuder, even some early or more recent iterations of Marduk could apply as similar to these guys – just more in terms of their more midtempo and darker moments.

That said, there is a tad too much attention to the blastbeat here, to the point where even the most droning and haunting of riffs is accompanied by a barrage of nonstop fluttering chaos. In other words, it’s black metal, circa the later second wave of the mid to late 90’s.

It’s polished enough and bears enough of an accomplished feel that it tends to transcend the boredom and ennui that should append to such template material.  Only, strangely enough, on the title track and its successor “spotsk” does this formula fail them, devolving into yawn inducing aimlessness (and in the latter case, Inquisition swipes).

Overall, not bad, and certainly better than you’d expect given the limitations they set on themselves. Just watch out for those slower, more meandering excursions to absolutely nowhere.