Not to be confused with the Swedish one-man black metal outfit formerly operating under the same moniker, the über-doom duo Blut call Hampshire and Dorset in the UK home and expunge a gurgling, grotesque misanthropy most black metal can only pretend to stab at in high-contrast black and white photos. Their debut full-length, Ritual and Ceremony (Wolfs Hook Records) tops out at over an hour and creates an atmosphere of such foreboding that to call it anything less than SunnO)))-esque is to sell it short. In three hyper-extended tracks, Blut go deep into dark psychedelia, punishing listeners with unyieldingly heavy riffing and brutal cackled vocals. Even when they see fit to throw a groove in, as they do eight minutes into the opening cut, “Throne Ritual,” they do so with the full knowledge of the brutality surrounding.

I get a lot of emails from bands, but Blut’s was immediately more interesting than most and a great indicator of the two-piece’s attitude and outlook. It was signed “fuck everything.” Bassist/noisemaker N.B. and drummer/guitarist/vocalist/noisemaker S.M. (it’s an initials-only kind of situation) recorded Ritual and Ceremony in Winter 2009, and the record sounds colder than the UK gets. It’s like they imported wind from Greenland. As the 24-minute opener gradually gives way to “And Death Shall Flee from Them,” the course of the album is set. For all the open space in their songs, echoing feedback, waves of pulsating noise, Blut have no room in their ambience for oxygen. S.M.’s vocals occur sporadically and in short burts, and it wouldn’t work any other way. From my understanding, the black metal cave from which they emit only allows sound to escape for a few hours of the forbidden night, and that doesn’t leave much room for lyrical headiness. Spew a little hate, move on to the next riff (or stay on the same one for another seven minutes). Not a bad ethic for this kind of record.

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