The Snow Glows in My Veins

Alaska has actually sprouted quite a few metal bands over the years, regardless of how remote and distant it may seem to most of us city folk. The bands coming from the Great White North’s westerly border are a mix ranging from brutal death metal to groove to power metal, which is surprising, at least to me. I would think that the cold climate and relative isolation would breed more in the way of atmospheric and depressive black metal, but, like many things, I find my assumptions and guesstimates wrong again. Now there are a few of the so called ambient and “nature oriented” black metal bands, but Nightsky is the only DBM band from Alaska that I’ve encountered, as of yet. Nightsky is a three piece black metal act from Anchorage, Alaska formed in 2004. Their third release, “The Snow Glow in My Veins”, is a short jaunt through the snow and aurora borealis that lasts under seventeen minutes. On display are four tracks, two of which entirely consist of harshly blowing wind over what sounds like a desolate landscape. Being that the intro and outro tracks are around a minute each, Nightsky gives us two tracks totaling a whopping fourteen minutes.

It’s usually rather difficult to ascertain what a band is all about with short length releases. I mean, honestly, a band gives you two or three tracks to chew on, and the rest is up in the air. It’s one thing when a band’s tracks are over the ten and fifteen minute mark, but when you’re tracks are of the middling length it can be a challenging undertaking. Aside from the blowing wind, the listener is presented with two actual songs, “Departure Into Nothingness” and “The Snow Glows in My Veins”. Rather than sticking within a prescribed sub-genre of the sub-genre of black metal (sub-sub-genre perhaps), Nightsky takes a bits and pieces from different places and attempts to make it their own. Unlike a lot of atmospheric black metal bands, I’m not transported to some otherworldly realm or distant land and unlike a lot of DBM bands, I feel no sense of overwhelming dread, anxiety or depressiveness dripping from the music.

The general feel of the release is an amalgamate form of atmospheric and depressive black metal. The drums and guitars are too fast paced and have too much rhythm to have a whole in common with the normal DBM scene while the vocals and production have more in common with bedroom DBM than anything else. For the most part, the drums are a fairly steady, happy go lucky pace: moderately fast running double bass with a poppy, almost annoyingly loud snare and the standard clang and bang. I’ll give the drummer a little credit, as the patterns are much more interesting than most atmospheric black metal bands but it also has much more of a rock feel to a lot of the sections. The drums are fairly solid for most of the playtime but they get sloppy during the faster sections: the blast beat section in the middle of “The Snow Glows in My Veins” shows a huge speed up in delivery but it also shows a huge decline in musicianship as the handwork is out of time. The guitars have a slight case of schizophrenia, as they range from treble-infused single struck notes in a minor key to treble-infused, moderately paced chugging. The single struck notes aren’t haunting, but rather keep the pace slow and plodding. These picked notes sound similar to what a doom act might play, only with less groove. The chugging sections are markedly better, from an instrumentation standpoint: there’s a dirty groove to it, enough to get you head banging. “Departure Into Nothingness” showcases this grooving chug as it builds to a climax towards the end of the track. My big qualm with the guitar lines is how they play off of the drums, or should I say, how they fail to play off them. When the drums are rollicking along with a grooving double bass run, the guitars seem flaccid and uninspired. The same can be said for the slower sections with single notes: it’s outright terrible at times, especially when the drums aren’t at their best. The beginning of “The Snow Glow in my Veins” shows how the band can do it properly, with a grooving power chord line playing off of the rock inspired drumming with dabs of juvenile lead lines thrown over top. The leads, as simplistic as they are, offer a nice contrast to the trebly, under-produced style. Let’s not forgot the vocals, which sound like typical DBM vocals, only maybe less anguished than most. The style is a cross between a distant throaty scream and a raspy shout. Like the rest of the music, they’re static filled and somewhat overbearing on the treble. It works at times, like the slower sections of the songs, but the faster sections see no differentiation on the vocals.

Nightsky has some great ideas thrown together in this short little release. Obviously, if this were a full length, the band would need to greatly step up their game, but being that this has only been released on CD-R and tape, we can call this a stepping stone. Their different approach to the drums is appealing, while the guitars and vocals are rather iffy. Perhaps better recording could flush out some of these problems, but as it stands, it’s markedly less than average. Two actual songs is a tough way to judge a band, but “The Snow Glows in My Veins” is a release that shows a band with a lot to improve on. There is also a lot of promise mixed in, as well. Perhaps Nightsky can make the necessary improvements and come back stronger the next time around (production, diversity, etc.). This is a strange amalgamate that is atmospheric and depressive while not firmly rooted in either camp and doesn’t really have the specific charm of each respective genre. If you dig atmospheric black metal and depressive black metal, give it a listen if you come across it, but this is by no means one of those hidden gems you should be digging for.