Konvent: Resurging Momentum
In years to come, when we look back at the annals of history, the first months of 2020 will stand as arguably the worst months to launch a campaign. With the impending COVID-19 pandemic looming around the corner, for fresh-faced bands across the world, releasing music into the world mere weeks before the global shutdown is tragically unfortunate. For Denmark’s KOVENT, they are a prime example of a band halted right in their tracks right as the sting of COVID hit European shores.
Released in January 2020, Puritan Masochism defiantly announced KONVENT to the extreme metal world through its skull-crushing amalgamation of death metal and doom, but as the pandemic hit, this promising band were stopped right in their tracks. For vocalist Rikke Emilie List, two years later and looking back, they were more fortunate than their peers. “We managed to actually do a promotion tour that we had planned. We we got home from the very last show and then I think a week later, everything shut down. So all things considered, we were quite lucky that we got to go out and do all the shows, visit new places that we hadn’t been to before,” she says. “Everything’s just complete chaos in the world now. And I mean, COVID is still very much a thing. So we don’t have any restrictions anymore in Denmark, which is a bit weird after two years of restrictions and people are still getting infected. Most people are triple vaccinated right now so so hopefully, not a lot of people will have like a very bad time with COVID.”
With the vice-grip of the pandemic easing, attention turns towards recovery. As the world awakens from the deep hibernation enforced from lockdowns and social distancing measures, for KONVENT, they intend to pick up right where they left off; through new album Call Down The Sun. A bleak and bludgeoning affair, the record appears on the surface to be a reflection of the turmoil we’ve experienced in the last two years but Rikke states otherwise. “I think there must be some inspiration in there somewhere. We started writing the the album when we stopped recording Puritan Masochism as we were just so inspired after that run in the studio. We just had a pretty clear idea of what we wanted the album and the songs to be about, even before COVID became a thing. So yeah, we pretty much followed that path. But of course, the writing of both the riffs and the drums, and the lyrics have continued through COVID so I’m sure that there’s some COVID in there somewhere!”
Albeit that Call Down The Sun is not necessarily a mirror reflection of the last two years, a cursory listen would suggest otherwise. Dark, harrowing and overwhelmingly bleak, the new album from KONVENT dives right into the abyss. Whilst the sonic template of their death/doom hybrid is ever-present, a sprinkling of more frostbitten black metal sounds permeates through the recording this time round and makes the end product that more sinister, something Rikke is pleased we picked up on. “I’m really happy that you that you mentioned the the bit of like black metal element elements. I think we would definitely love to have more of that. But the problem is, we’re not very good musicians,” she laughs. “So you can’t play that fast. Maybe on the third album?!”
Armed with a brand new full-length, it appears that the world is very much ready for KONVENT to make it their own. Their trajectory may have been derailed by the pandemic, but now, they are ready to make 2022 their own. “I think I’m a bit nervous of what people are going to think. I mean, of course, we’re all proud of the album. But I think you can never finish an album and go ‘this is perfect, I wouldn’t change a single thing’. There are still things that I would like to change. But I think if I had that opportunity, I just wouldn’t stop, like correcting and scratching things out and adding new things, stuff like that,” Rikke explains. “So we were set back a bit due to COVID because our rehearsal space is owned by the municipality of Copenhagen and they chose to shut down all their all their rooms; whether it be like libraries or rehearsal spaces and stuff like that for five months. So we couldn’t rehearse for five months and we could write riffs at home and lyrics at home. I feel like if we’d had those extra five months, maybe the record would have become even better, but you can’t change the past?”
Call Down The Sun is out now via Napalm Records.
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