(written by Islander)

Thorns of Ruins makes its first appearance in ours page today. It is the solo work of Thomas Aamodt, who is probably better known for his other project, the Norwegian black metal band Ildfar.

We’re informed that the idea for Thorns of Ruins started back in 2022 when some of the songs that would become Ildfar’s second album, Nattemørkets kall, did not fit within Ildfar’s universe. Rather than abandon them, Thorns of Ruins was formed – and since then Aamodt has strived to create even greater musical separation between the two projects.

That separation is now most evident in Thorns of Ruins’ second album, Stellar Reverence, which will be released on August 13th by a trio of labels — Satanath Records, Black Plague Records, and Pagan Fury Records.

The new music still shows its connections to black metal, but it also reaches across genre lines to create intersections with doom and death metal, and to craft melancholic, atmospheric, and melodic experiences. We have an example of how multi-faceted the music is, through our premiere of a lyric video for the song “Wicked Souls“. Continue reading »