Angst Skvadron - Flukt

Being the brainchild of Trondr Nefas (here using the pseudonym T.B) of Kvist (one of my three favorite black metal bands of all time) and Urgehal fame (as well as many other bands), you would not expect Angst Skvadron to sound like your typical run-of-the-mill black metal band, and you would be correct. "Flukt" is a trippy journey indeed, a psychedelic avant-garde black metal ride into outer space.

The album starts out with a very boring intro that's not much more than some Space Invaders-like sounds and a few filter sweeps on a keyboard. Once you've heard it you'll always skip ahead to track two when listening to the album again, believe me. Fortunately track two, "Silent Night, Alien Night" is a lot better and starts out with a nice syncopated drum rhythm accompanying an eerie guitar arpeggio before going into a black 'n roll part. Good midtempo stuff that picks up towards the end and leads into the third track, "A Song To The Sky", where a haunting keyboard makes an appearance as the guitar again plays some eerie arpeggios.

The rest of the album continues mostly in the same vein, with inventive midtempo songs mixing progressive guitars with keyboards, but still keeping one foot firmly planted in the black metal soil. The best track is in my opinion the very last one (not counting the outro), "Beyond Andromeda", where T.B's vocals are especially haunting as he chants the title of the song over and over as the song fades out into the infinite vacuum of space.

"Flukt" is a good album that I will return to many times, especially when I get a tired of the harsher old school black metal. This is a little out there, but if you like Kvist and early Arcturus you might like Angst Skvadron too. I think this album is worth a very solid 7/10, and I hope to hear more from this interesting band in the future.

Band link: http://www.myspace.com/angstskvadron