This is the debut release from Carpe Noctem, an Icelandic Black Metal act who bring together a post-apocalyptic soundscape with structured chaos to create something that is bleak, intense and raw, all at the same time. This is a concept album about an ethereal journey within and without the self, exploring concepts of life, death and the nature of evil. It is about overcoming and reaching understanding through strife and hardship, about self-flagellation of the soul. The album title calls upon Cain’s journey into the wasteland of Nod, the self- made exile from God’s creation. Imagery from nature and light references to Nordic myth permeate the text, which is both vivid and esoteric in description. The order of the songs count down at first, and then upwards, signifying the initial descent into the earth, into the dream or afterlife, and the subsequent transformation and resurrection.
There is a bleakness that permeates this album, a chilling frost that never goes away. It is as black as the deepest Winter’s night, and one imagines this being the soundtrack to a landscape that is oppressive and frightening in so many ways. This is not music for the fainthearted, but if you enjoy Black Metal in all it’s majesty then this is essential, as it is for real. It is strange to think that this is a debut album as there is a confidence and dark passion throughout that lifts this in so many ways. In many ways this is reminiscent of the early days of Norwegian BM, but at the same time it is very much it’s own being. Essential.
