This Friday the 13th truly offered a descent into darkness for the unwary of Barcelona, for the Northern Ritual arrived to town.
The show started with the one and only Mortiis suddenly appearing to play his sort of steampunk-inspired synth in a solitary ambience surrounded by the beautiful artwork of his latest musical endeavours. As with his other Era I (Dungeon Synth) shows, the performance consisted of the whole “Spirit Of Rebellion”, his full-length which marks a return to the roots and actually consists of a newly imagined version of “Anden Som Gjorde Oppror”. This set list really seems to achieve the purpose of encompassing his whole Era I discography in a single concert, and the live adaptation didn’t seem to lack any strength as I feared, but it filled everything with an even more powerful aura of dark dungeon music.
Halfway through his epic show, the eerie troll got some real percussion incorporated in his soundscape by the help of a shamanic sidekick who appeared to have formed out of thin air. Now with furious drumming to aid the glorious synths, the music distanced itself more from the originally reimagined album to the style of other more orchestral cuts from his first releases, though freshness was present throughout the whole show. The drummer combined his rhythms with sweet drumstick tricks and tribal movements to offer the needed movement that complimented the music.
As the album came to an end and the mighty initial melody was powerfully reprised for a last time, it felt like the performance should’ve been longer, even though its length seemed to be carefully explore to offer something long enough to be thoroughly enjoyed and not annoying. Mortiis surely offered all Dungeon Synth fans what they’ve been longing for since their forsaking after “The Stargate”, and his return couldn’t have been more triumphant.
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After half an hour more or less between bands, Mayhem stormed in with “Falsified And Hated”, and their assault was followed up by the odd choice of “To Daimonion”, but “Daemon” was reprised with the catchy “Malum”, and the album was further explored for a while, delighting the newcomers who may have recently discovered the band. Their track list then slowly started shifting towards older tracks, especially most of “Wolf Lair’s Abyss”. Hellhammer’s enormous and antichrist-filled drums which were surely used optimally and Attila’s usual disorienting moves and toying with bones, skulls and suicidal ropes slowly warmed up the public until a moshpit erupted during their eighth song and remained fairly constant during the rest of the concert.
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After that, the Norwegian Black Metal pioneers disappeared for a while, only to return cloaked and with a flag of a certain Scandinavian cathedral substituting the “Daemon” cover flag. That frigid intro of “Freezing Moon” then awoke all dormant malice from the fans of their magnum opus, and during the 4 performed tracks of “De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas” any true Black Metal enjoyer felt the soothing flames of hell caress their ears from the speakers as the songs were played almost identically as on the full-length, although where talent was prevalent, passion didn’t seem to be always there.
Then, the darkness slowly faded to show the gore of “Deathcrush” when yet another change of flag and looks transformed the band into an early Extreme Metal act, sweat, bullet belts and red became the new main ingredients and pure fucking Armageddon broke loose. After “Silvester Anfang” hyped up everyone, the moshing intensified and necks started to shatter from excessive head banging. Their final display of chaos in the form of their debut marked the violent end of an occult night which started by soaring across the world of wonders. When the final song ultimately ended with a short fire show and the burning of guitars and Attila, the Northern Ritual now went for their next victim: Madrid.
VARG THE MIGHTY
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