ULVER
Nattens Madrigal (DELUXE Ltd. Ed. Numbered)

Black metal

Ole Alexander Halstensgård, Kristoffer Rygg, Tore Ylwizaker and Stian Westerhus – went full isolation in their studio below the haunted hill, fantasizing about bygone nights of slasher, exploitation, and giallo. Three or four months went by, the band returned to the living, and sent their radiophonic workshop experiments off to the Dogs of Doom, France, where friend and fellow film freak, Carpenter Brut did a razor-sharp mix before taking it to Thibault Chaumont (Deviant Lab) for the master.

Scary Muzak, on one hand a homage to Carpenter’s themes – five out of twelve tracks are covers whereas the rest comes from the outer realms – and on the other zooming out on the aesthetics of the late ’70s and early ’80s popular culture. It is perhaps the Norwegians’ most hauntological moment, whirling up themes and moods, horrors and mysteries hidden in the foggy back alleys of your youth. Imagine the gloomy siblings of Les Humphries, Gert Wilden, and their respective orchestras, armed to their teeth with synths, pads, FX. Sometimes classy and chilling, other times amusingly smooth and sleazy, and at times outright beautiful in its suspense-filled vigour, Scary Muzak is an inspired, goblinesque addition to the ever-expanding Ulver catalogue. Interior films, remember?

House of Mythology proudly presents the official release of Ulver’s monumental Grieghallen concert from the 2018 Bergen International Festival.

Grieghallen 20180528 documents the pinnacle of Ulver’s 2017–2018 touring cycle, following the release of their landmark album The Assassination of Julius Caesar. A massive explosion of sound and light went off in Bergen that night, leaving the baffled audience floating somewhere between pleasure and fear.

Professionally multitracked by the Bright AS stage tech team, Kristoffer Rygg and Anders Møller were asked to mix the tracks for the 2020 “streaming edition” of the same festival. After having circulated as a YouTube bootleg, it is now being made official partly due to popular demand, and partly because we think of it as a magnificent companion piece to the studio version of Caesar – showing Ulver at the height of their live game.

2025 reissue on Gold vinyl