ALBUM REVIEW: Extinction Rituals – Nadir

This may be the debut album for Norwegian blackened hardcore outfit NADIR, but it’s far from their first rodeo. Having released their stellar EP The Great Dying in 2020, the quartet made clear the experience they’d gained from their time in prior bands JAGGED VISION and OCEAN DWELLER. Here on Extinction Rituals, they take it one step further with an accomplished and vital debut album.

Across 10 tracks – well, nine and an intro – NADIR seamlessly fuse the ferocity of hardcore with the atmosphere of black metal for a violent listening experience. Opening track Iron Lung belies the newness of the band, displaying a confidence and swagger that would have established bands watching their backs. This is clearly a band that means business, as solidified by the relentless pounding of Jonas Bengtson‘s drums and Ole Wik‘s throat shredding vocals. The Old Wind and Absolute allow Wik and Magnus Wiig to dole out acerbic guitar lines that shatter like frozen lakes, while the bass of Erik Gullesen is felt in the deepest pits of your being at every turn.

Putting all of those elements together results in Extinction Rituals being a bleak affair. A labyrinth of despair and unrest is illustrated across 43 intense and unyielding minutes, barely pausing for breath and in turn refusing to let you do the same. Even when the atmospherics are being built up through painstaking layers, there’s an urgency that you can’t take your ears off of, intricate and irresistible as they are. The odd draw of this album is in how much it challenges the listener without ever putting you off.

A Name On Every Rope starts drenched in KNOCKED LOOSE levels of feedback before building through ominously slow drums and a lilting, off-kilter guitar melody into an almighty outburst of vile blackened hardcore that’ll make you feel like you need to take a shower. Utterly grotesque in its distortion and heft, it’s an irresistible exercise in sonic brutality that you’ll come back to time and time again. Later, I Strid leans much more into black metal territory, transporting you to a desolate, snow-filled forest, the cold seeping into your bones. Still highly violent in its blast beat-laden ways and Wik’s vocals sounding more and more ticked off and urgent, but there’s a desperate sadness about it – it leaves you feeling miles from salvation, knowing your days are numbered.

Elsewhere, NADIR add yet more texture to their exhilarating sound, with classic thrash tinges in the closing passages of Beyond The Shadow Of Death. Yet another instrument for them to exact their wicked vengeance, it slots in effortlessly, not feeling shoehorned or forced. To have all of this in their repertoire reveals a band teeming with talent and ideas and one that should be watched very closely indeed. 

Extinction Rituals is nothing short of fantastic. Captivating, crushing and cathartic, NADIR grab you by the throat and refuse to let go. They tighten their grip, your vision narrows, all you see is NADIR… but you embrace it.

Rating: 8/10

Extinction Rituals is out now via self-release.

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