At once expansive yet also confined, the texture of Nortt’s sound has polarity. Like a ship marooned in the unforgiving Antarctic ice, the crew huddles in cramped quarters, yet outside is the unending tundra. With reverb used to good measure on all instruments, guitar riffs rebound off the planks of “Afdø,” like the yowling wind, carrying sounds within sounds. The resonance of each snare strike hammers home the reality of their collective fate, while the distressing background loop is the perpetual, yet futile hope of a search party.
Nortt’s patience provides the fulcrum for his craft. The tempo of “Afdø” tantalizes, trudging through waist deep snow drifts. It is the pace of starvation. Depleted of fat, the body begins to burn muscle tissue. Nortt plucks each taut tendril, before it is consumed. His leaden growl is the harbinger of demise. “Afdø” is the sound of decay.
Across a frosty wasteland, a member of the crew wanders in search of seal, hunting with a staggering step. He hears a distant cry. A rescue crew? A hallucination? The aural mirage washes over him, closing his eyelids.
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