Style: Raw black metal
Primary Emotions/Themes: Wolf in man
Thoughts: This was my introduction to Ulver. This was my introduction to raw black metal. This was my introduction to so many things that would lead to my future within the metal genre. This album. Perhaps one of the strongest black metal albums ever released.
There are so many rumors about this album. It was recorded in a forest with a 4 track. Century Media gave the band a large amount of money for the recording and they spent it all on a car and suits instead. I have no idea of the validity of any of those claims but they add to the mystique of the album for me.
Ulver's evolution is on full force with this album. Coming from the mellow and tranquil acoustic album to perhaps one of the rawest black metal albums recorded at the time. The transition from one album to the next is incredibly jarring if listened back to back.
As much as the previous album is the nature's beauty, this album embraces it's harshness and brutality. The guitars are produced so incredibly bright that they can give me a headache if I listen to the album for a long time. It feels like everything is clipping, the vocals in particular have a lot of distortion on them compared to the rest of the instruments.
The drums are barely audible, and the bass is a low rumble. It's all a jumbled mess... and it's perfect. Everything is designed to be as inaccessible as possible. It took me forever to get used to this, it was just a wall of noise the first few times I listened to it. Something I would play to my friends in school as a joke.
The thing was after a time I found myself liking it. I found myself really liking it. I began to form a sense of arrogance around how much I liked this and no one else was able to get into it. After twenty something years of listening to this beast it still holds a fond place in my heart.
So what is it about this album vs. so many other raw black metal albums that draws me in? It's a combination of that raw atmosphere along with the incredible riffs and compositions. Once you cut through the fuzz there is some truly exceptional music. The chaotic riffs dance around each other, the twin guitars work so well with each other to create one giant wall of sound that is difficult to process without repeated listens.
In-between the tracks there are small ambient sections that add to both the atmosphere as well as the mystery of the album. What was the band going for when they put those in? Why would they add three to four seconds of ambience in this spot in particular? I don't think I'll ever know, but the album isn't the same without them.
Nattens Mandrigal is not only one of the most important black metal albums for me, it's one of the elite. Ulver would never revisit this style again, and I don't think that they need to. They proved what they are capable of here and if Ulver has shown me anything over the years it's that they evolve.
Written January 15th 2024
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