One of the most creative minds in underground heavy music is the Finnish-based Brit Mat ‘Kvohst’ McNerney. Once the singer of black metal bands Code and Dødheimsgard, the brain behind post-punk/deathrock collective Beastmilk, now Grave Pleasures and currently active with The Deathtrip and a very welcome guest at Roadburn. At the moment, most of his time and energy goes to Hexvessel, a psychedelic folk rock band with which he has re-embraced black metal influences since the release of Polar Veil in 2023. Much to the undersigned’s delight.
This Polar Veil was performed in its entirety at Roadburn last year and the day after, a magnificent musical ode to the night was brought under the title Music For Gloaming: A Nocturne. A work written especially for the festival and how special it is that the music is performed in this way for the first time and shared with the fans. And as happened once before with Skuggsjá, Waste of Space Orchestra and the Icelandic collective Sol An Varma, the complete piece has now been recorded. And thank God, because this fantastic music alone (sinking further and further away) in your memories would be a bit of a shame.
The atmospheric piano intro sets the tone for an adventure that takes you on a journey from light to darkness and back again, but above all to musically capture the essence of the night. The psychedelic folk of yesteryear is still very much present, but gets a much darker character through the addition of the 90’s black metal influences. Sapphire Zephyrs is immediately an example of a song in which many elements come together and in which the contrast is constantly sought. First, a beautifully sensitive piano theme is accompanied by cutting guitars, after which a black metal riff a la ancient Ulver and Gorgoroth is started and MacNerney lays his heavenly uplifting vocals over it. Especially the chorus gives me goosebumps to the bone! Then you as a listener are taken on an acoustic intermezzo that ends in a dragging piece with spoken word and which eventually leads to a pompous climax with fierce screams and then the grand singing of Saara Nevalainen (Sapata). It all sounds a bit much, but it really works.
Let’s jump to the last two songs on the album. Unworld is a dragging, slightly avant-garde composition in which good friend Vicotnik (Dødheimsgard) takes care of a large part of the vocals. This creates a different atmosphere compared to the rest of the album, but above all it gives it extra depth. And the final piece Phoebus is another beautiful example of hard, raw black metal (with icy screams from Oranssi Pazuzu‘s Juho Vanhanen), paradoxically combined with beautiful, grand bombast and beautiful clean vocals.
I can tell you that it is quite a special experience to first experience an album live, then have no music to fall back on and then a year later you can still enjoy the album. The memories of that show come flooding back when listening to Nocturne for the first time. The result is in any case even better than I had hoped. Just like its slightly less profound (but in my opinion just as strong) predecessor Polar Veil, this Nocturne is a classic in the making that I will often listen to. Close your eyes and let this transcendent ritual carry you through the night.
Score:
90/100
Label:
Prophecy Productions, 2025
Tracklisting:
- Opening
- Sapphire Zephyrs
- Inward Landscapes
- A Dark Graceful Wilderness
- Spirit Masked Wolf
- Nights Tender Reckoning
- Mother Destroyer
- Concealed Descent
- Unworld
- Phoebus
Line-up:
- Mat McNerney – Vocals, guitar
- Ville Harkonen – bass guitar
- Jukka Rämänen – drums
- Kimmo Helén – piano, keyboard, violin, guitar
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