Nott has, since the project’s inception, been about ultimate heaviness and bleakness. I’ve known this one-man project since the Obsidian Depths EP, and I have also downloaded their first work, Devouring Deities. All of them fulfilled my needs for insanely heavy, slow, dissonant and distorted music. The new arrival, Abyssal, is no different.

Spewing the tale of the God of Hatred eradicating humanity, Abyssal takes us to new musical depths. From what I can tell, he’s tuning in A or A#, which is pretty damn low, supporting the concept of the abyss and surely adds some weight to the record (despite what that guy says). This EP seems a lot more downtempo than their previous ones, if my memory is any good. Making it sound almost like Black Tongue or Traitors at times, but always coming back with a tasty rhythmic breakdown pattern which makes the EP less monotonous.

The music sounds a bit muddy at times. It might be the first time and probably the last you’ll hear me say, but I think the bass is too loud in the mix. I’m a bass player so I’m always like “can you raise me up a little?” but I think that the guitars would benefit from a little boost in the sonic department, or maybe it’s the distortion used on the bass that’s the culprit, I couldn’t tell.

The vocals, as always, are almost vomited to you and that’s one of the key elements to Nott‘s insanely twisted sound. And the lyrical content is quite good, depicting this divine eradication in a putrid but somewhat beautiful manner. My favourite song is definitely Swallowed By The Rot, in part because of its length (7:16) which makes it the most well developed song on the EP. Also, there are some almost middle-Eastern sounding soundscapes in the background, which is really interesting in the context. Finally, the instrumental closer is a beautiful drone piece where we can envision the purity of the land after it’s been cleaned.

It’s a remarkable EP that will fit your daily need for heavy brutal music.