(written by Islander)
The origins of the phrase “elevator pitch” are murky, but the meaning isn’t. It refers to someone describing an idea to someone else who doesn’t have long to listen, or doesn’t want to give you much time. You’ve got the length of an elevator ride to get your point across and sell it.
In our field, record labels, publicists, and artists make elevator pitches too, usually in writing. Some are better at it than others. Sometimes the elevator pitch for a band’s music tells you pretty much all you need to know in deciding whether to check out the goods, especially when a band’s music isn’t much more complicated than a couple of quick paragraphs can capture. But sometimes the elevator pitch really doesn’t tell you (and can’t tell you) everything that makes the music worth hearing.
Which brings us to the New Zealand band Vaeovon and their debut album Spiritual Nullification.
Here’s the elevator pitch proffered on behalf of the band’s label Gutter Prince Cabal, which will release the album on April 20th:
With Spiritual Nullification, Vaeovon deliver a relentless assault of lightning-fast, razor-sharp blackened death metal that is bewildering in its intensity. Propelled by retching vocals and relentless blasting that only briefly relents to sink the knife in deeper, the album unfolds as a vortex of frenzied riffing that seems to rip sinew from bone. The result feels like a speed run through hell while being dragged behind an unstoppable daemon engine, violent, suffocating, and utterly uncompromising.
That turns out to be a pretty good elevator pitch for the album, because everything it so vividly describes is in fact present in Vaeovon’s music. But this is one of those short descriptions that doesn’t tell the full story — and there’s no criticism intended in saying that, because this is a case where it’s difficult to capture everything that’s going on in the music with a few pithy sentences.
What Vaeovon themselves say about the album’s concept hints at some of those hard-to-summarize features of the music:
Spiritual Nullification explores the concept in which a morbid entity hungers not only for the death of the living but for the chaos that dances on the fringe of reality. The void, a cosmic abyss beyond mortal comprehension, whispers promises of power, enticing him with the allure of ultimate dominion.
And indeed, while Vaeovon’s music is undeniably fast, frenzied, and violent, it also does turn out to “dance on the fringe of reality” — to become unearthly, mysterious, and strangely alluring — even when it’s simultaneously scathing listeners with utter ruthlessness. How it does that demands more words than an elevator ride would allow (at least if you’re as wordy as this writer is).
The album’s protagonist introduces itself to listener with “I, Vaeovon“, an opening collage of eerily quavering and warbling tones soon joined by sonic swaths that harshly sear and scream and by elegantly chiming notes. All by itself, it seems to represent the concept quoted above.
But it’s the next song, “Mantra Vitalis“, that represents the superheated core of the album’s music. With drums blasting at hyperspeed, it simultaneously discharges both dense, abrasive guitar-swarms and the ethereal (but unnerving) quiver of cleaner tones — an interesting combination of contrasts. On the vocal front, Vaeovon manifests as a violent demonic bestiary, furiously ejecting imperious roars, torrid screams, and strangled screeches.
The riffing is mad and mauling, a heavy-grit sandblasting of listeners that nevertheless doesn’t overpower those strangely ringing tones — which also undergo their own convulsions as the song proceeds. Other aspects of the song also become stranger things: the rhythm transforms into a lurching thump; the bass seems to muse instead of thunder; the lead guitar wails (before resuming its convulsions).
And so, perhaps unexpectedly in light of the elevator pitch, the song is as mysterious and intriguing as it is slaughtering. “Dreaming of a Stygian Night” reinforces that impression, combining sensations of sheer, mind-broiling chaos with strangely seductive melodicism, and shifting from ferocious blast-beats to bracing gallops and bouncing marches.
The guitars again frantically quiver and the bass vividly bubbles, but the shivering background music (which might be keys but might be guitars) also swells to create a haunting and menacing evanescent backdrop — yet another aspect of intrigue to accompany the music’s rabidly writhing and ruthlessly scathing fretwork and all the unhinged vocal tirades.
The next two songs, “Plague Reverence” and “Death Proclamation“, are more or less in line with the previous two, veering from dizzying blast-front storms of violent dementia to instrumental episodes that are at least quirky and often hallucinatory, accented by ambling bass notes and bursts of barking vocals. It’s almost as if we’re witnessing grand mal seizures followed by beckoning dreams (in which red-eyed things might be lurking).
Mid-way through, Vaeovon provide an interlude named “The Moment the Veil Tore“, which reminds us that the album’s narrative includes enticements of the power-hungry protagonist offered from a “a cosmic abyss beyond mortal comprehension”. The music sounds vast, ugly, pitch-black, and ephemeral. The beat is like the slow thump of an immense pulse; something hideous howls and snarls from within.
After that, Vaeovon start ripping again with “Infernal Servitude“, which sounds like dense swarms of hornets around unsteady grooves and then explodes in a razoring tempest of dissonant contorting guitars, hammering drums, and blistering screams — but with odd stops, starts, and cymbal clicks in the mix. It might well be the album’s most unnerving and twisted experience yet, and maybe a sign that Vaeovon will use the post-interlude phase to bewilder listeners to an even greater degree than before.
They reinforce that impression with “Depths of Nullus” and “Shadow Dissolution“. There’s a bizarre kind of elegance in the first of those as the riff-swarms seem to dance ecstatically, and the jubilant humming of the bass also sounds strangely warming — though the vocals are anything but.
“Shadow Dissolution” is, if anything, even more wild, even more macabre, both vocally and instrumentally — but it also takes a very dark turn. At nearly 9 minutes, it’s also the album’s longest and most variable song. It overflows with both lunacy and hallucinations, including phases in which a scratchy and slithering solo guitar creates a very chilling and almost chime-like spell, albeit a spell of misery. Rising and spreading keys, coupled with dismally quivering guitars, deepen the feeling of endless agony. Even the echoing roars and harrowing screams sound wretched.
At the very end Vaeovon present the album’s title song, which functions as a very daunting synth-laden instrumental outro, one that includes sounds of solemn tympanic drums and grieving orchestral strings. In this album-length tale, its protagonist meets no good end.
Well, those were a lot of words for sure. You might get them out if you rode elevators for a year. But I thought this album was so multi-faceted and so interesting that it warranted such a gigantic disquisition, which I hope will give you plenty of reasons to give yourselves over to the full album stream we’re now presenting:
The album was recorded throughout 2024, with vocals recorded at Funeral Studios and all instruments tracked at Ifrit Productions. Mixing, mastering, and the album’s ambient tracks were handled by Oli Smith. The cover artwork was created by Warhead Art, with additional artwork by AS and layout by DJM.
Gutter Prince Cabal is releasing the album on CD, MC, and digital formats, and they recommend it for fans of Angelcorpse, Black Witchery, and Rites of Thy Degringolade. Pre-orders are available now.
PRE-ORDER:
https://vaeovon.bandcamp.com/album/spiritual-nullification
VAEOVON:
https://www.instagram.com/vaeovon_nz
https://vaeovon.bandcamp.com
GUTTER PRINCE CABAL:
https://www.gutterprincecabal.com
https://www.instagram.com/gutterprincecabal
https://www.facebook.com/Gutterprincecabal
https://gutterprincecabal.bandcamp.com