The whole reason I grabbed this promo was because of the mention of The Birthday Party; they’re such a wild, balls-to-the-wall part of Nick Cave’s history that name alone drew me in. The Back of Beyond is a fucking banger; it’s ridiculous how good this album is.

Right off the proverbial bat, Dry Wedding grabs you by your pathetic cerebellum with “Arrowhead”, and there’s that raucous abandon that made The Birthday Party so awesome back in the day. Chugging along with gusto, it becomes a Gothic Western number with a bit of Fields of the Nephilim flavor.

There have been setbacks in the past that might have destroyed a lesser band, but they have soldiered on. There was the pandemic and the release of The Long Erode (2020) that had the band doing shows behind glass, and then in 2023 some asshole stole their van and gear during a West Coast tour. The second album was released independently and is titled Sway (in case you were curious).

Moving on, track numero dos is “The Serpent Box” it is super upbeat, like a court jester on Meth. It jingles and jangles to a crazy Birthday Party beat. It’s wild and unhinged, and is followed by one of my favorite tracks on The Back of Beyond, “Sure as a Gun”. It’s angry, spewing vitriol and resentment, but it’s taking its time while doing so. It’s in no hurry whatsoever, a slow, meandering ode to murder.

“Blood-Red Vengeance” features some killer slide guitar and, for the most part, just exists in its own psychotic story; it’s also the shortest song on The Back of Beyond, coming in at just 1:59 minutes. Nonetheless, it leaves its bloody handprints all over the album. “One Last Strand” feels like a Punk-Western version of “Whiplash” by Metallica. It’s ridiculous fun, and it will get your ass moving. It gathers power and unleashes it until the vibrations shaking the earth have subsided. Chadwick Ferguson treats his bass like it owes him money. A vibrant, malicious track if I ever heard one.

“Moths” is haunting and triumphant, the chorus is massive, and it all swarms around your head, bouncing off and coming at you from all directions. It’s a hair raising track and I fucking love it. “Shifting Wilderness” is the last track and it fucking smokes like a wildfire in June. It’s not fast, it’s just steady sailing on black waters. This is the kind of music that is perfect for 100+ weather, dry and brutal and utterly unforgiving.

It’s safe to say that I’m all in for Dry Wedding. Albums like this are rare and I grab them when I can. The Back of Beyond is a stellar album. It’s mixing of genres and the way it grabs you from the get go are the reasons why I think you need this album in your life.

If you like Nick Cave, Fields of the Nephilim, Swans and 16 Horsepower; you will no doubt eat this album for breakfast. So run, walk, drive or fly to your nearest mom and pop record store and pick it up. You won’t be disappointed.

But then nothing for 5 years, other than an instrumental digital-only EP and a single. But, as the saying goes, good things come to those who wait. And now on newly formed German label, Vesperian, and again produced/mixed by Arioch from Secrets of the Moon, I’m happy to report that The Nocturnes of Iswylm is indeed worth the wait, as the band continues on thier D & D inspired journey, and this time gets even more adventurous and confident.

As with the debut album, the band is still locked into 90s symphonic black metal with the usual suspects like Dimmu Borgir, Arcturus, Old Man’s Child, Abigor, and Emperor (heck, even the back panel of the album mirrors Emperor’s Nightside) as the base, and certainly at times, the development of the songs here mirrors Emperor’s growth from Into the Nightside Eclipse to Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk and IX Equilibrium, with shades of more progressive, controlled and adventurous song writing interplaying with the symphonic metal bombast.

Clear examples of this can be heard on “Saccharine Subjugation” and surprisingly restrained”Imperious Sanguine Eroticism”, where Otheyn Vermithrax delivers some Ihsahn-ish croons (which also appear on closer “The Ballad of a Fallen Star”).

But for the most part, the songs are classically inspired symphonic black metal, like “The Black Dragons of  Iswylm”, which has a pure mid-era Dimmu stomp or the Ancient – ish canter of “Echoes in the Vasts of Sequestration”. The more furious “Carnal Tapestries of Nailtorn Flesh” covers all the bases and inspirations, including a little thrashing Cradle of Filth, into the album’s most direct track.

And there may even be hints of power metal, just with harsh vocals – for example, the opener “The Taste of Immortal Blood”. That’s a power metal chorus right there.

As the rangy and varied 9 and a half minute closer “Ballad of a Fallen Star” wraps up the album, I’m left impressed, but I prefer the more classic keyboard style from the debut, and I’m still wishing the band would write those one or two genre or career-defining songs. All the songs are great, but they need that “Progenies of the Great Apocalypse”, or “Inno A Satana”, to cement their legacy a little more (I will say, “The Seer” from the last album is really close).

Hopefully, we won’t have to wait 5 years to get it on the all-important third album.