59. Necronautical – “Apotheosis”

The Black Metal keeps coming. This is home-grown stuff from the North West and is practically interesting because all the quasi-religious and occult nonsense has been replaced by literal influences. It’s still dark and melancholic but the narrative touchstones are Nietzsche, Palahniuk and Gaiman as opposed to Crowley and LaVey. It just feels really ambitious, as if the band want to create the soundtrack to an unmade movie they all playing in their heads. There is a lot of really good British Black Metal (in fact there is more coming up later in the list), but most of it tends to stick to the Nordic formula. Necronautical however seem intent to push boundaries and see how cinematic they can take this usually claustrophobic and internal art form.