Dark Fortress: When 1000 Crypts Reawaken – Fifteen Years of Stab Wounds

In their 25 year tenure, DARK FORTRESS have made themselves synonymous with the melodic black metal style. Their debut album rippled through the underground: produced under the watch of Markus Stock of EMPYRIUM fame, and adorned with their distinctive Christophe Szpajde logo, Tales from Eternal Dusk showcased a blend of Swedish melodicism and Norwegian grimness which would gradually evolve and become the band’s signature sound. Going from strength to strength, in 2004 the band released Stab Wounds – the album which would come to define their sound thereafter. After several years of physical and digital inaccessibility, the DARK FORTRESS classic is at last back on shelves and available to stream, having now been remastered by their very own V. Santura [Victor Bullok].

“I’m the main songwriter and that kind of started with Stab Wounds,” Victor explains, “but I really didn’t write the album alone.” The album also features contributions from fellow guitarist Asvargr, while interlude piece Vanitas … No Horizons was composed by keyboardist Paymon. Stab Wounds features technical arrangements in which sinister melodic leads are propelled forward by the relentless, mechanical precision of the drums. The overall effect is to produce an exuberant and potent variety of black metal, which is able to retain a great deal of melodic intuition within its nihilistic atmosphere. “I think that it was very hard to write the album but there was also a certain enthusiasm about it,” Victor continues, “we were quite inspired at the time.”

Two studios were used to record Stab Wounds: Studio MSG in Deggendorf and Studio Eins in Landshut. “We booked a studio for the drums because we needed a bigger studio with better acoustics,” explains Victor, “and we did the rest, as far as I remember, in another studio, ran by a guy who I went to school with. I went to the SAE college in Munich, and in 2003 I had finished audio engineering school. A schoolmate of mine had started a studio right after we finished school in our hometown and so we booked studio time there. We also did the mix there.”

The production on Stab Wounds is very clear, perhaps unusually so for an album in the black metal style. There is very little interference between the guitars, which can be appreciably discerned, while the snarling vocals sit front and centre in the mix. “Stab Wounds was basically the first album that I ever produced,” Victor remembers, “and when you do it for the first time it’s clear that you will not quite, at the first try, achieve a result which you’re 100% happy with. I always thought the production is fine because it captured the emotion of the music. And the power of the music came across. That’s the most important thing.” Sighing, Victor continues. “Nevertheless, I always thought the sound was quite thin. The guitars sound quite thin, it was all quite screechy. A lot of treble, but still it sounds like there was a carpet in front of the speakers.”

In spite of his valiant first effort, these concerns led Victor to work on the master himself some fifteen years later. “The remaster sounds much closer to what I had in mind back then. Of course, I’d now do something different in the mix – but when I hear the remaster, I really enjoy it.”

Stab Wounds features cover art and layout design by the renowned Travis Smith, who has more recently produced artwork for OPETH and FLESHGOD APOCALYPSE alongside a longstanding series of pieces for KATATONIA albums. “Our old singer was really fascinated by the cover from Tonight’s Decision by KATATONIA. Me too, by the way. I knew some very old KATATONIA stuff back then. I didn’t really like it,” Victor confesses, “but then I saw the cover of Tonight’s Decision, and there was something about the cover which made me think: ‘I really need to listen to that, because if the music sounds how the cover looks then I’ll probably really like it.’ So, I got the album and I fell in love with it. It’s a really good cover. We got five different drafts from Travis, five different approaches, five different pictures, and we just chose the one that we chose, which was also happened to be my favourite. We took a democratic vote and the majority voted for that cover, and I still love it; it’s quite unique.”

Looking forward, we asked Victor whether we might get to see some more songs from Stab Wounds performed live in the wake of the reissue. His response was non-committal, but assuredly diplomatic. “Maybe. We also have a new album out, so it’s a bit difficult because of course we want to fit in some new songs as well.” Accommodatingly, he continued: “We still regularly play When 1000 Crypts Awake. In recent years we’ve been playing Iconoclasm Omega, but not always, I would consider playing that again. Also Self-Mutilation, because that was one of people’s favourites. We could potentially play all of them. I expect in the future we’ll play at least a couple of them.”

Stab Wounds (Reissue) is out now via Century Media Records.

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