Album Review: Nidingr – Greatest Of Deceivers

//Album Review: Nidingr – Greatest Of Deceivers

Nidingr greatest of deceivers album review

 

NIDINGR – ‘GREATEST OF DECIEVERS’

By Alan Oliver 

This is the band founded by Teloch, more recently of Mayhem fame but featuring current or ex members of the likes of 1349, Dodheimsgard (DHG) and God Seed amongst others. ’Greatest Of Deceivers’ (G.O.D see what they have done there!) being the third full length album from these Extreme Metal Norwegians. Cover art for those who are interested is by Metastazis who has created covers for Watain, Ulver and Blut Aus Nord to name a few.

They have honed their brand of Black/Death Metal even further since their first 2 albums and on initial listening it took me back a number of years as the Dodheimsgard (DHG) style of music passed over my aural receptors. This is complex and technical Metal, writhing like an angry snake with pace and tempo changes around every corner. Straight away there are various layers: jangling guitar, blistering blasting drums, rumbling bass line and the hoarsely screamed vocals as it kicks off with lead, and title track, ‘Greatest Of Deceivers’. No sooner have you gotten into the rhythm of things and the pace changes from the rapid multi chord changing guitar lead style of black metal, to a slower more heavy choppy riff, then right back up to speed again. Two thirds into the track it all changes again to a slower more ethereal sound with a heavy bass melody leading to a bass solo finale. This is the basic structure of the whole album yet no track repeats itself in order to make it sound repetitive. ‘The Worm Is Crowned’ kicks in with a heavy groovy style, imagine latter day Entombed in a black metal style and you will be near the mark. It also has an air of At The Gates to it, further entwined around the fluctuating pace of the track. ‘Pure Pale Gold’ has a riff that would have Beavis and Butthead head banging with their infamous “Da Na Nan Naaa” sing along. ‘Dweller In The Abyss’ could easily have been an Emperor intro, more epic build up, that breaks into a Heavy Metal type riff before building once again in a rapid paced more traditional Black Metal style.

This is a well produced album with a more retro feel to the sound which only compliments the varied and skilful musical content. It would have been so easy to loose any one of the separate instruments into the mix but it is balanced well throughout with emphasis placed on the right elements when needed. The vocals range from darkly spoken, as on ’O Thou Empty God’, then nearing modern Opeth’s clean style demonstrated on ’The Worm Is Crowned’, through to epic tormented screams. The drumming knocked me sideways, parts are so fast with blasting double bass it seems inhuman, but it can also be as hard hitting and rhythmic as any traditional heavy metal backing. The bass rumbles along both brooding and staccato heavy at times, with the unusual bass solo added conservatively to round certain tracks out. And then there’s the guitars that have a traditional fast jangling riffage of rapid chord changes to, occasionally, a more Prog style jam lick. Tracks take you on a rollercoaster of sound and then like a guillotine dropping, they end.  No need for long epic outros here.

This is a well rounded album as avant garde, at times, as Arcturus and as menacing as Deathspell Omega on others. If you like Dodheimsgard (DHG) then you will love this. If you like complex extreme metal that has a lot of twists and turns then I will highly recommend this. And if you are bored of the repetitiveness of some modern metal you would do worse than to check these guys out if you haven’t already. Another impressive album coming out of Norway, like you expected any less. 8/10

By |2012-11-22T00:00:00+00:00November 22nd, 2012|CD Reviews|0 Comments

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