Kvelertak + Mantar

In the organizer's words:

Presented by Rock Antenne and curt

Special Guest: Urne

Kvelertak is the gold standard for punky, black metal-tinged, classic rock worshipping extreme music. The band, described by Revolver as "blackened rock'n'roll party beasts", are truly unlike any other with their triple guitar harmonies and heaps of lyrics written in their native Norwegian language.

Songs like "Crack of Doom", "Bråtebrann", "1985", "Mjød" and "Blodtørst" are modern metal classics. In contrast to the complacency of many of their contemporaries, Kvelertak's music is fierce and fun. The tracks on their brilliant new album "Endling" will no doubt be just as popular, from "Krøterveg te helvete" to "Skoggangr" and "Svart September" to the album's amazing title track.

Kvelertak arm themselves with massive riffs, punk rock attitude and energy as well as black metal ferocity. Hailing primarily from Rogaland, which borders the North Sea, the six men of Kvelertak (Norwegian for "stranglehold") summon a double dose of urgent power from their countrymen, from the chilling, primitive black metal of Darkthrone to the boisterous debauchery of Turbonegro. Their robust, five-album catalog defies easy categorization, shifting back and forth between subgenres.

The band's touring history reads like a list of heavy metal legends. They have supported Iron Maiden and the Foo Fighters in Norway and toured with Slayer and Ghost. James Hetfield showed up at one of the band's shows in San Francisco, California. Soon Metallica took them on the WorldWired Tour, including a historic gig at London's 02 Arena in 2017 that broke the venue's attendance record.

Each album reliably lands in the year's 'best of' lists, from Decibel to the Village Voice. A decade after its release, Kerrang! ranked the band's debut among the essential records of 2010, along with Avenged Sevenfold, My Chemical Romance and Deftones. "Endling", Kvelertak's fifth album, arrives in 2023 with a thunderous aim. Drawing deeply from local traditions and folklore of the non-fantasy variety, the evocative songs tell compelling stories of elemental wonder.

"On Endling, we tell the stories of the extinct and dying men and women of Norway," explains guitarist and cofounder Vidar Landa. "Old and new myths, culture, and rituals come to life - the folklore that doesn't fit a TV series concept. Vikings and trolls are for television. This is the real deal."

The band recorded most of the songs live in the studio and only one with a click, resulting in a raw and organic feel. The riffs and tones are as varied as audiences will expect from Kvelertak, with crackling immediacy and temperament. There are also new instruments like piano and synthesizer layered through overdubs. "Endling" is the band's most straightforward and at the same time most ambitious work to date.

Kvelertak have recorded most of their records with Converge guitarist and producer Kurt Ballou. As the band was unable to travel to America this time due to space constraints, Landa, co-founders Bjarte Lund Rolland (guitar) and Marvin Nygaard (bass), longtime guitarist Maciek Ofstad, frontman Ivar Nikolaisen and drummer Håvard Takle Ohr (who joined in 2019) recorded "Endling" in Norway.
Kvelertak dates back to 2007 and the release of their demo "Westcoast Holocaust". Their reputation as a Stooges-worthy live act earned them a record deal. Their self-titled debut reached number 3 in the Norwegian charts and stayed in the top 20 for months. In 2011, they won two Spellemannprisen (comparable to the American Grammy). In 2013, "Meir" became the band's first number 1 album in Norway. Kvelertak toured with Metallica in Europe and with Ghost as support for the 2016 album Nattesferd.
Nikolaisen, who has been friends with the band from the beginning and was a guest musician on the first album, was living in relative seclusion in the forests of Nordmarka when Kvelertak recruited him to take over as frontman in 2018. "Splid", which featured both Nikolaisen and Ohr, debuted at number 1 in Norway. It made it onto the album lists of Consequence Of Sound, Loudwire and Metal Hammer, among other publications.
During the pandemic, fans in 53 countries watched the spectacular Live from Artilleriverkstedet livestream in 2020, which was later broadcast in prime time on Norway's largest TV station NRK.

"I've learned to mentally prepare for the worst," Nikolaisen says of the lessons he learned in forming Splid, acknowledging that the well-documented volatility within the band continues to threaten its long-term existence. "But I've also learned that I can trust the guys to be brilliant musicians.
They honed the new songs in a hole-in-the-wall biker club, where the owner's 16-year-old blind border collie pooped on the floor every morning before rehearsal. Like the band's near-legendary triple-guitar attack, "Endling" also boasts the talents of three producers: Jørgen Træen, Yngve Sætre and Iver Sandøy, each of them successful as producers as well as musicians.
"You might be wondering why we needed three producers," explains Nikolaisen. "Let me tell you, the atmosphere in the room is always very intense and sometimes even violent when it comes to Kvelertak. Each of the producers needs a break from time to time. We're too much for one person."

The album is bursting with catchy, to-the-point hard rock melodies. But when it comes to instrumentation, production and storytelling, Kvelertak paints with broad strokes of ambition and confidence. Since the release of the incredibly well-received Splid in 2020, there have been many crises in the part of the world where the band lives. Instead of singing about it, Kvelertak wanted to create a haunting kind of escapism. The lyrics are all in Norwegian, but there is an English introduction to each song.
"With Splid, we started to look more at our local history instead of repeating the overrated stories from classical Norse mythology," Landa explains. "We've spent the last few years hiking in the mountains, hanging out in rural villages and libraries, searching for the true stories of our past and present. At a time when the outside world was closed to us, we traveled within the borders of our country and within our minds. What we found both frightened and entertained us, and we turned these stories into the lyrical backbone of this album. Some of these voices are aggressive, with a bleak view of modern society, while others are nostalgic. Not so long ago, we celebrated death (Likvoke) on these shores. Being around the dead better prepared our bodies and minds for change.

If the band itself is heading for a "change", this is not evident in the music. Kvelertak sounds bigger and more creative than ever, even if this period remains as unpredictable as any other. "Kvelertak is an 'endling' in itself, the last of our kind," Landa notes. "We can disband and disappear at any time, total collapse and catastrophe are always within our grasp. But for now, we are still here. Like a constant supernova in its most destructive and brightest phase. We've never been better!"