The Norwegian Black Metal scene is like our universe: always expanding and nobody can say if this is for good or bad. Well, for the Black Metal scene being bigger and bigger was not good, since it became a trend. Additionally, it lost its course over the years in order to be more popular. But still there are some bands that try to keep the flag of Black Metal up high without following the masses.

"Stemning" is NÀTTSÒL's debut album. Born in 2006 as a project of guitarist Erlend Antonsen, they, as the press release is saying, were working in secrecy all these years. And now four years later they are introducing themselves with this album. Their approach to Black Metal could be linked to the early days of ULVER, ENSLAVED and some figments ofVINTERSORG (without the happy melodies of course) and a bit of DIMMU BORGIR from the "Stormblast" era. The biggest problem when you are playing music like this, where nothing is innovative and you can't add new elements, tends to become outdated. "Stemning"(meaning "mood" in Norwegian) is not an album like that. Even though it still has the old atmosphere, it flows nicely and brings back memories and images without being preterit. The speeds in most of the album are mid tempo and the parts with the acoustic guitars and the clean vocals give that 'extra' in the whole dark atmosphere. The lyrics, from what I read in the press release and understand by the titles, are talking about the Norwegian nature: the fjords, mountains, forests, and mirror-like lakes.

You can't say that NÀTTSÒL are not copying older bands of this old-school atmospheric Black Metal, but they do it in such a way that you can't accuse them. They have their own ideas and the album seems that it is theirs and not just parts from other albums. The production is helping too, by being as fresh as it should have been; powerful but not too modern. In an era that many crap albums are out there, "Stemning"is an album that fans of old-school atmospheric Black Metal will enjoy.