Occasionally an album comes along that is more of a needed corrective than a form of entertainment, and Nordstahl with Ragnarok in Berlin is just such a no holds barred artistic statement. Conceived of in frustration at the general apathy and intellectual dishonesty, this industrial metal project uses the weapon of Norse mythology to deal some of the most pressing social commentary you are likely to find in modern metal.
The first thing that comes to mind is the fact that the project does not provide comfort. Each track convert the characters of the mythology into allegories of modern failures, turning Thor and his silent hammer into an expression of unrealized braveness, Loki into a symbol of moral relativism, Midgard into a slumbering figure of doom with everyone asleep. The German lyrics bring rough reality and make one emotionally connect with these uncomfortable realities as opposed to purely intellectual readings.
It is in the sonic landscape that this composition really shines with the work entitled Ragnarok in Berlin. Nordstahl combines industrial metal destruction with epic orchestral sounds and makes a battlefield where mechanical accuracy and organic desperation collide. The grinding machine-like rhythms impel each song on with agitated unease, as sludgy guitars and bleak synth lines create architectural soundscapes of intended dissonance. The songs such as “Mjolnir” are brutal and heavy, yet they also contain the elements of silence, which is a strategic weapon of power that, unfortunately, is not used.
The most successful thing in the album is the ability to make the ancient mythology urgently modern. Friggs Falscher Trost is a lacerating attack on false reassurance in the face of crisis, whereas Lokis Lügen generates hissing, twisted, grotesque soundscapes that reflect the way our time has learned to embrace flexible truth. This isn’t background music or escapist entertainment, this is metal with a mission.
Nordstahl urges the listeners to go beyond passive consumption of music as well as life and asks them to quit long-lasting deliberation and begin to act. In a world where there is far too much information, and not enough wisdom, Ragnarok in Berlin is a mirror and an alarm clock, in that the apocalypse will not come, the apocalypse comes to us every day: the choice between courage and complacency.
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