Mork announce new EP ‘Pesta’

October 31, 2020 James Weaver

MORK have announced a new EP!

Titled Pesta, the upcoming four track EP from the highly-regarded Norwegian black metal band is scheduled to be released in November this year, via Peaceville Records. The release of the EP comes on the back of 2019’s Det Svarte Juv.

The lead track on the EP was composed as a reflection of the mood of current times, as well as drawing inspiration from the art and music world, with the main motivation to record the track stemming from a visit to locations portrayed in the works of celebrated Norwegian artist, Theodor Kittelsen.

Speaking about the upcoming EP, band mastermind Thomas Eriksen says, “the Norwegian artist Theodor Kittelsen (1857-1914) has been a important part of Norwegian black metal since the early 90’s. His drawings have been made famous in the genre from famous Norwegian black metal releases. Kittelsen’s artworks has a haunting, eerie and mysterious effect on the viewer. Most noteworthy is his work on the book Svartedauden (The Black Plague) which was originally published in 1900. This summer I travelled in Norway, which I do every once in a while, since our land has a lot to offer. During the trip I passed through the valley where Kittelsen resided, and visited the farm, Lauvlia, which is open for visitors. While there I did some research and found out that a couple of the drawings in Svartedauden is based on real actual places. Some phone-calls later I got to arrange an audience at one of these locations. I returned to Sigdal along with photographer, Daniel Pedersen, and got to have a special shoot at this magical place. The Kittelsen drawings Pesta i trappa and Musstad is based on a particular house on a different farm, where the artist lived for a while. I got into my MORK get-up, full with corpse paint and all, and got to work. The pictures speak for themselves. A great day and experience for a black metal artist and nerd as myself. A big thanks to the staff at Kunstnerhjemmet Lauvlia and to the owner of the property, Sole Gård.

I was considering just releasing these photos for fun, and that would be it. But, then I had a talk with a good friend of mine, who basically told me that it was a bad idea. His point was that I should create a song to go along with the pictures, to have a better package. So it all fitted nicely together with the current COVID-19 situation, that I wrote a song about the Black Plague called Pesta.”

Alongside the announcement of the new EP, you can view both the track list and artwork for the upcoming release below:

Track List:

1. Pesta
2. Valen
3. En sti inn i Remmendalen
4. I Hornenes Bilde