Ascending Canadian post-punk sect Pøltergeist will release their debut album Nachtmusik, on October 25 via Bad Omen Records. Recorded in their native Calgary and mixed by Felix Fung (Spell, Spectres) at Little Red Sounds in Vancouver, the record is a dust covered collection of gothic death rock laced with heavy metal grit, which builds on the momentum of the band's debut 7" "Fall To Ruin" - a split with label mates Spell.
Nachtmusik is preceded by the single "Children Of The Dark", perhaps the most perfect distillation of the Pøltergeist style;, a catchy, tempestuous rocker that also functions thematically on a dual level- not only as Kalen reckons "a call to arms for people who share a passion for underground music" but also arriving via a morbid angle to assault the iniquities of the modern labour market; a Stokerist-critique of late-stage capitalism, if you will, but laden with biting hooks.
As Edgar Allan Poe once noted in The Masque Of The Red Death, "there are chords in the hearts of the most reckless which cannot be touched without emotion" - it was exactly these that Kalen Baker reached for - in splendid isolation in Grande Prairie, Alberta - at the very genesis of Pøltergeist, whilst fashioning the sepulchral serenades which would form his new band's mighty statement of intent 'Nachtmusik'.
Having played in the traditional metal band Whyte Diamond in Calgary in his teens, Baker moved 450 miles away for work in late 2019. "It was harsh and isolating being away from the Calgary scene, and I didn't end up meeting many musicians who were into the same stuff as me" he notes. "I started recording demos alone in the room I was renting and put them on Bandcamp. I didn't expect much from it, I just wanted a way to make music".
This isolation was exacerbated by the pandemic, and coincided with a period in which Baker's tastes were broadening from the epic metallic chills he'd grown up on into darker quarters. Having always had a penchant for the mystical metallic strains of Angel Witch, Cauldron and Blue Öyster Cult, he found himself moved by both Vancouver contemporary post-punk act Spectres and the epochal British melancholia of The Chameleons' 'Script From The Bridge', not to mention gothic and post-punk legends like Sisters Of Mercy and The Sound, and paradigms of the ethereal like Cocteau Twins, Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine.
"I consider us first and foremost a Post-Punk band, but heavy metal will always play an important role," says Kalen, citing the likes of In Solitude, Unto Others and Tribulation as bands who've explored the hinterlands between the two worlds. "When I got really into Goth rock, one thing I noticed was that it was just as cold and bleak as black metal but in a different way.”
With this union bolstered by the lyrical influence of spiritual progenitors like Moorcock, Lovecraft, Poe and the David Lynch of Twin Peaks, the sound of Pøltergeist was born - a gritty but magickal realm where crepuscular intensity is joined in psychic battle by metallic fortitude. Whilst the like of the driving “Burning Sword” and “Ethereal Nightmare” may bear the ghoulish atmosphere of deathrock fury past, they're just as riven with the epic bravura and melodic salvation of the finest NWOBHM vintage, as well as possessing an emotional core that transposes the sound and fury to a contemporary world.
The band is now completed by guitarist Jacob Ponton, former Whyte Diamond bassist Ben Wytham and punk rock-styled drummer Amy Moore (although Al Lester from label mates Spell filled in on the recordings) and this line-up recently fulfilled a dream of supporting their trans-generational kindred spirits The Mission in Calgary - sure to be only the first of manifold triumphs to come.
Nachtmusik is true to Kalen's vision of 'a kaleidoscope of emotions, sounds and ideas'. Beguilingly ethereal but riven with steadfast intent, this is a record whose heart may yearn for the spiritual realm of the 1980s but whose feet are firmly treading the twenty-first century here and now. As storm clouds gather overhead, Pøltergeist's journey into darkness is just beginning.
Tracklisting:
“Einfürung”
“Burning Sword”
“Ethereal Nightmare”
“Cold In September”
“Yesterday Fades”
“Nachtmusik”
“Children Of The Dark”
“Swallowed By The Ocean”
“Will We Ever Live Again”
“Walking Alone”
“Dammerung (Outro)”
“Children Of The Dark” video:
