Norway's Covenant (later known as The Kovenant) started as a black metal band, but are one of those bands who turned into something different. Covenant's sophomore album 'Nexus Polaris' flew out off Norway's fjords and the Earth's atmosphere, and headed out of our galaxy straight into bizarre cosmic industries.

This is a nexus of various forms of metal music. The music is very happening indeed. It's something like a cosmic symphony, that is a bit warped, performed by a metal band. There is everything from black metal to death metal, and from power metal to heavy metal riffage, and that infamous carnival music. Similarities with Arcturus are plain, because synthesizer astronaut Steinar "Sverd" Johnsen and the drummer extraordinaire Hellhammer play on this one, but also the musical resemblance is quite big. Swedish Skyfire also comes to my mind, because of uplifting and epic power metal style guitar work. Generally, 'Nexus Polaris' still possesses dark ambiance, even though at times is as colourful as spatial creativity. The likeness with Old Man's Child and similar Norwegian bands is easily sensed, even though 'Nexus Polaris' is far more adventurous than about 99% from the big names of Norwegian (black) metal. Darkness full of light... The symphonic and spacey synthesizer work enhances more terrestrial guitar work. The drumming is what one expects from Mayhem's Hellhammer: Imaginative and proficient, bringing new dimensions into the music, even though it is not as accurate as a metronome. The war-march and sweeping panoramas into peculiarity of 'Chariots of Thunder', the entangling beauty of 'Bringer of the Sixth Sun' and the blasting 'Dragonheart' are my favourite triplet from the album, but the other material isn't left far behind.

Nagash's creaking voice approaches comical at times, but on the other hand is fully suitable with this kind of music. Think about Dimmu Borgir's Shagrath and Abbath of Immortal, but add some trollish behavior in it. Astral female voice, "starsong" as written in the credits, is performed by Sarah Jezebel Deva and responds with beauty to Nagash's rascally voice. She doesn't sing any lyrics. The lyrical content is astral, but yet scouring through inner space.

The Siggi Bemm production done at Woodhouse Studios, Germany, gets one thumb up from me. In the mix, the instruments are well-balanced and the sonicscape is clean. While the sound is clean, it also feels like it misses some frequencies. Generally the album sounds trebly, with a solid low end, but in the whole it feels somewhat flat, like something was missing from the centre. The guitars surely are crunchy and the bass is awesomely heard. The drums are trademark Hellhammer stuff, not that heavy at all. The cover artwork by Andread Marschall really depicts the music found inside.

'Nexus Polaris' is a lively vestige from the time before Covenant changed their name and turned into a boring, machiney cash inflow sucker (yeah, many see this already being such a thing, but I do not). It has a lot of character of its own, even though some of its elements could be so much better, for axample the vocals by Nagash and the production job. On the other hand, 'Nexus Polaris' offers fantastic means for escaping and the song material is adequate and at times even better. Not far from the classic accolade!

Rating: 9 (out of 10) ratings explained

Reviewed by Lane
02/22/2009 15:14