(written by Islander)
Ten years ago we premiered Total Vacuum, the debut demo by the Swiss band Antiversum shortly before its release. Almost eight years ago we then premiered the title song from the band’s debut album, Cosmos Comedenti. Finally, Antiversum are coming back with a second album, this one named De Nemesis Omnes et Omnia, set for release on September 19th by Amor Fati Productions, and once again we have a premiere.
Upon learning about the album I couldn’t resist investigating the meaning of its title. It’s not a classical Latin phrase, but seems to be Antiversum‘s own construction. Most likely, it literally translates to “Of nemesis, everyone and everything”. An AI comment I didn’t ask for when google-searching suggested that it means “all people and all things are either subject to or derived from nemesis,” and possibly as “a declaration that divine retribution and vengeance apply to everyone and everything in existence.” I suppose the reference to divinity derives from the fact that Nemesis was, after all, a Greek god.
These interpretations of the album title, though unconfirmed, would be in line with the fundamental nihilism inherent in Antiversum‘s profoundly disturbing musical representations of horrifying menace, cosmic collapse, and the vast maw of the void that awaits.
Photo Credit: Void Revelations
To introduce the new album Antiversum led with the release of its opening song “Pulsar Feralis“. The album as a whole encompasses five long songs, which extend from almost 8 minutes to more than 14, and “Pulsar Feralis” is the longest of those. To borrow from some thoughts I expressed here after first hearing it:
The song’s introductory phase creates a freezing and hostile atmosphere, with waves of static, eerily whistling transmissions, and ghastly voices. Then the music starts to heavily pound and batter, segmented by bursts of buzzing frenzy and eventually giving way to blasting drums and even more maniacally whirring fretwork.
Antiversum continue to ruthlessly pound but they also needle the listener with piercing guitars that dismally wail and frantically quiver, while the reverberating words come forth in cavernous roars, strangled snarls, and maddened cries — all of them frightening.
The band also continue flipping the switch, speeding up and slowing down but never diminishing the forceful punch of the drums, creating moods of violence and agony, of immense menace (thanks in part to the titanic impact of the bass tones), utter hopelessness, and shattering catastrophe. All in all, the song is a gripping nightmare.
Now we come to our today’s premiere, which is the album’s title track. Relatively speaking, it’s one of the album’s two shortest songs, but still clocks in at more than 8 minutes.
It starts coldly pounding right away — and crackling like some entity made of nuclear radiation. A horrid voice howls and roars from the void, and the music briefly slows and groans. A lead guitar wails in torment and the music fades away, leaving naught but dark drones and cacophonous voices.
But this nightmare is just beginning. The unnerving tones of a rapidly vibrating guitar paves the way toward enormous percussive booms and expansive swaths of abrasion through which notes peal like fractured bells of misery. Dismal tremolo’d riffing and furious low-end fevers ensue, along with ruinous jackhammering grooves and viciously clawing chords — though the bells continue ringing out, like heralds of calamity.
Antiversum continue twisting their progression, injecting flurries of insectile fretwork, methodically neck-wrecking and ritualistic beats, cavernous roars, and slithering guitar leads that straddle a line between agony and poison. The music builds toward a maelstrom of violence, and a finale in which the band remorselessly hammer the listener — but still send out those bell-like blasts of sound, a siren call for extinction.
Just these two songs, “Pulsar Feralis” and “De Nemesis Omnis et Omnia“, are powerful evidence of just how masterfully Antiversum have integrated elements of death, black, and doom metal to create chilling visions of dread and downfall, whose horrors turn out to be transfixing, like nightmare spells.
De Nemesis Omnis et Omnia will be released by Amor Fati Productions on September 19th, on CD, vinyl LP, and cassette tape formats. In due course more info will be available at the locations linked below.
AMOR FATI:
https://www.amor-fati-productions.de
https://amorfatiproductions.bandcamp.com
ANTIVERSUM:
https://www.facebook.com/antiversum