Blut aus Nord — Saturnian Poetry

Blut aus Nord is a band I never really got into. Obviously I gave the band another chance when their 777 trilogy rolled out, but that style of weird, dissonant black metal just really does nothing for me. So I was somewhat apprehensive when I received Saturnian Poetry because I was expecting something along the lines of their 777, MoRT, or Odinist albums. But what I found instead on Saturnian Poetry is probably the best piece of melodic black metal of 2014. Maybe it’s unfair, but whenever a band is still producing material twenty years after its inception I automatically assume that they’re well past their prime and are just going through the motions. In this case I was flat out wrong. Saturnian Poetry isn’t necessarily adding anything new to the scene but it’s an excellent example of a band kicking ass well into their career.

Apart from the brief keyboard into, the album keeps the pedal to the metal with dynamic, epic, melodic riffage. There’s a fierce refusal to stick to just a main riff or two, instead, the tracks are made of numerous varied riffs that are always changing and driving ever forward. Although the vast majority of these riffs are tremolo picked, there are a couple times where things slow down and evolve into dizzyingly atmospheric sections where great bending chords ring out, tolling out over and over. These moments are my favorites but sadly only appear at the end of “Paien” and “Metaphor of the Moon.” Still, the melodic tremolos are fantastic and the fact that these slower sections are so rare simply makes them all the more amazing. The amount of variation is something of a double-edged sword. One the one hand, it means that it’s will take many, many listens for this album to get stale. On the other, it’s difficult to tell where you are in the album at any given point because there isn’t really a main riff to each song. To some that might be a bad thing, but I actually like how that forces you to listen to the whole album instead of a single track with the best riff.

A problem I have with a lot of melodic black metal is that bands frequently delve into sappy sounding melodies. For the most part, though, Saturnian Poetry avoids this pitfall. There are a couple of riffs that are painfully sweet, but Vindsval’s buried shrieks and some furious drum work keep things grounded. This release features the work of an actual drummer, unlike many of BaN’s other albums. The result is a much more organic, warmer sounding release. Obviously that effect is helped by the warmer guitar tone, but the difference between the drums here and their industrial sounding albums is huge. Sparing use of keys complete the package, fleshing out that epic, victorious sound Saturnian Poetry aims for. 

This is the first Blut aus Nord release I actually enjoyed and apparently the other two albums in the Memoria Vetusta series are along the same lines. Unfortunately, the vast majority of the band’s releases don’t work for me, leaving me in the strange position of liking just a small percentage of their output. Still, there might be more albums in the Memoria series, so I won’t ignore the future output of Blut aus Nord. If you don’t care for the band’s other material and were planning on giving Saturnian Poetry a miss, you might want to change your mind, because this album is fantastic.