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By Alaskan Bergwanderer
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I’ve said this a number of times over the course of the past six months since this album has been released; at first glance The Wheel and the Universe by NUBIVAGANT shouldn’t work as well as it does. Second wave black metal colliding head on with ’70s doom rock. Extremely repetitive riffs, somewhat formulaic songwriting, exclusively clean vocals that stay in a limited range… how does *that* equate to one of my most listened to albums of the year?
In short, it comes down to refining the songwriting process to where subtlety is king. What does that entail? On tracks like the opener ‘Into Eternal Night’ its going from one extreme to the other; a repetitive second wave worthy riff going into a repetitive doom number. On the *sultry* ‘The Mask And The Devil’ its a simple chord change between verse and “chorus” riffs. And yes, I said *sultry*. Listen to that and tell me that when that chorus hits you don’t picture some Satanic priestess of Anton Lavey‘s doing some sexy dance with a snake draped over her shoulders. Oh… just me? Okay, moving on then….
By far the best display of these subtleties is on my personal album highlight ‘Clothed With The Sun’. On this one the main verse riff never changes, but the *drums underneath* said riff absolutely changes the feel and the effect the riff has in that moment, depending on what the drums are doing. Then the subtle (there’s that word again) shift from what I would call the “bridge riff” back into the main riff almost feels euphoric. And it’s all built on simply how the drum parts play out. Friggin’ brilliant. The musicianship overall is brilliant, when you really break it down. Should be no surprise when one Gionata “Omega” Potenti is the one behind Nubivagant. One look at his band list on Metal Archives tells you that this is no subpar musician forced to write simple music. Given what I just laid out above, an argument could be made that this music is not as simple as an initial listen would lead you to believe.
In regards to the vocals and the borderline monotone pitch on display throughout this record (“borderline” because there are slight shifts in pitch in different parts)… well one more thing about the music that ties into this next subject; the repetitive nature of the music I believe is to be perceived as a mood setter for a ritual, something to put you in a meditative or even hypnotic state, to put complete focus on the task, whatever that may be. The lyrics are as seemingly simplistic and repetitive as the music. And, given the (again) “borderline” monotone pitch, you can think of the lyrics as words for recital behind a pulpit. Words of mantras, words of magic, words of ritual application. Words that require calm, even, yet assertive vocalization. Feel free to disagree, but that’s my take anyway.
Now, my earlier point of “second wave black metal colliding head on with ’70s doom rock”? A little of it is specific to the music itself, as it’s very much second wave black metal until it’s not, and then if you to put those clean vocals over the top of some fuzzed out Sabbath-riffs, it’d probably work very well. Shit, switching the vocal stylings between this project and one Astral Spectre would make *too* much sense…. *ahem*. Anyway. A LOT of that earlier point comes down to the production. The music is wrapped up in a nice blanket made of warm tones, very much giving this a heavy ’70s reel-to-reel analogue vibe. Honestly, it’s PERFECT for this album.
Simply put, this album (and project) is rather unique to today’s scene. Or, better yet, it at least occupies a fringe space that’s out of the norm for today’s scene, along side the afforementioned Astral Spectre. I can’t recommend this enough! Even though I know it won’t click with everyone. And if you find you DO like this, then the debut album Roaring Eye should be on your list as well, especially if you want this music a bit more *cold* sounding.
The Wheel and the Universe is available now via Amor Fati Productions.
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Purchase The Wheel and the Universe on CD, cassette, LP and digital from the Nubivagant Bandcamp HERE, from the Amor Fati Productions Bandcamp HERE, or the Amor Fati Productions webstore HERE.
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