Whenever I get an email mentioning "Siberia and "metal" in the same breath, I immediately assume that it's about a funeral doom band (and more often than not, that it's from Solitude Productions). 99 percent of the time I'm right, too, but Ultar's black metal experiment threw me for a loop.Their new album, Kadath, came recommended by a friend (of course, he plays in a Siberian funeral doom band), who knows I've got a soft spot for pretty black metal. Ultar is that and more; they've got those rippling little melodic trills I love so much and a heavy shoegaze influence, but are no strangers to aggression, either—a firm appreciation for the post-metal loud/soft dynamic is on full display here.
The album's quite moody, but instead of howling about despair, Kadath sees them haul out a bit o' the ol' Lovecraft. They describe the album as "a journey of a young man to the Kadath, Lovecraftian divine City of Gods, hidden in the Land of Dreams", but also as the great lifelong journey that we each make in search of ourselves and our inner freedom that will light the way."If that sounds like something you can fuck with, I highly recommend you press play on our stream below, and snag the physical version from Temple of Torturous on October 21.
Kim Kelly is staying dark on Twitter.