New band featuring Finnish metal scene legends opens an ancient chasm of Black Metal, born of an epic tradition.
Rising from the deep valleys of Kymi in southernmost Finland, I Am The Night is Black Metal rooted in the classic early 90’s tradition, where walls of guitars and synthesizers raise the forces of darkness in a battle against the heavens and burning angels light up the night sky.
The band’s debut full length album, with cover art by scene legend Necrolordbears the title “While The Gods Are Sleeping” and shall be released on May 6th, 2022. The record was birthed during the heaviest blizzard Finland had seen in years in the winter of 2021, with the band holed up at the Soundspiral Audio studio during the height of the pandemic. “This album, in a way, is both the thing that should not be and something we should have made flesh many moons ago already”, comments Markus Vanhalaand continues: “It is a passage back in time that dark forest of our minds through which we spent our youth traversing.”
Together with the album announcement the band are set to release a second single from the album, titled “Ode To The Nightsky”. The music video for the song was created by Coldstore Productionsand it is online now.
Brought forth by underground titans of Finnish Metal, Markus Vanhala (Insomnia, All’s Gatherum), Janne Markkanen (ex-Omnium Gatherum), Okko Solanterä (Horizon Ignited) and Waltteri Väyrynen (Paradise Lost, Bodom After Midnight), the band’s origins date back to the dimly lit subterranean rehearsal rooms of the mid-nineties where the fires of Old man and Markkanen’s Black Metal zeal were ignited.
“Black metal art has been a continuous and serious pursuit in my personal life since my early teenage years”, explains guitarist Vanhala, and he continues; “In The Nightside Eclipse, Storm Of The Light’s Bane and The Mysteries of the Lord Satan opened the gate to the dark side for me years ago, as can be heard from the music we make with I Am The Night.”
In recent years I Am The Night rapidly began to gather flesh on its old bones, and in 2020 the spark burst into a full blaze when elder statesmen Old man and Markkanen hired younger cohorts Väyrynen and Solanterä to help bring their morbid visions into reality. Old man states that: “Our debut record, the result of a yearning for ancient darkness, turned out to be just the time capsule we wanted it to be, far removed from modern metal. I’ve seldom found anything interesting in post nineties Black Metal. We wanted to realise this in the underground way that felt fitting to the music, and chose to work with Black Records.”
“Our songs are stories about the worship of night and the triumph of the powers of darkness. At night, sun to his slumber and shadows all over, the forces of the night rise to the heavens, cast angels out and usher in a new era of individual freedom”, vocalist Solaterä explains
“I Am The Night is a real band not a project. It is unrestrained creation. A ray of darkness for us in the vacuum created by the pandemic. The future remains unseen, and all the better for it.”
Seldom has an instant classic band and timeless sound reached our ears at Black Records,but we are certain that there will be hordes of new initiates, prepared to declare I Am The Night their favourite new ray of darkness. Open the gate to your eclipse now.
Line-up:
Vanhala – guitar, synth (Insomnium, All Gatherum)
Markkanen – bass (ex- Omnium Gatherum)
Väyrynen – drums (Paradise Lost , Bodom After Midnight)
Solanterä – vocals (Horizon Ignited)
06.05. I Am The Night: While The Gods Are Sleeping LP/CD (Pre-order link)
25.02. I Am The Night: Ode To the Nightsky (digital single pre-order/order)
(Could be translated from Finnish)