Nunfuckritual - In Bondage to the Serpent

God, that band name sucks. Seriously?

It sucks particularly because it makes genuinely interesting, lushly textured music hard to take seriously.

Anyhoo, Nunfuckritual (aka Danny Lilker in Culted)  are, genre-wise, what I'm now calling doom/black. It's got the cool hyphen, like death/grind, and also sounds sorta meme-y, like you're cool for knowing the contraction that for that particular genre of music.  As you might guess, they're (atmospheric, sometimes nearly ambient) doom metal with distinct black metal imagery, production and vocal trends (i.e., the fucking of nuns, one can only presume; a very "chilly," i.e., treble-heavy mix; and a strangled shrieker of a singer). Think Sunn O))) with Mortuus singing, and occasional drum usage.

Specificity:

"Theokotos"-- atmospheric/ celestial (irony?) blackened doom/ drone; quite beautiful, like a guitar-heavy Henryk Górecki, until about 2:25 when the vocals enter, and sound like something GG Allin would scream (still over the Górecki-isms, though, you see, herein lies the uniqueness).

"Komodo Dragon, Mother Queen," hits like  Rammstein's "Mein Herz Brennt" if it were played without machines....

"Christotokos," the ambient soundscaped sounds (and not necessarily music) of the damned.... "Cursed Virgin, Pregnant Whore," confirms the Sunn O))) comparisons, and goes for long without any drums, simply a droning guitar line. Of course, when the drums return, they're blast beats. And it pretty much works.

"Parthenogen," continues the Sunn O))) worship (though again, chillier, with less bass in the mix), then becomes a lurching behemoth (though not Nergal and co.) of a doom metal tune; this is maybe the best track on here: it comes off as confident through its many stylistic changes over the nearly 8-minute running time.

Why does this music appeal to me so much? Goddamn-- I need a new therapist.

Overall, an "unrated/ NC-17" vibe here, like anything can happen at any time; menacing, and musically-speaking, surprising; drearily beautiful, like funeral mists that catch a sparkling moonlight.

--Horn