It is a rare feat when we are reviewing an album for the band that recently went defunct. It is even a rarer feat when the band premeditated its own end. Norwegian industrial post-black-death trio V:28 did just that with their latest installment VioLution. They ended the band’s existence after they thought they were finished with the trilogy detailing mankind’s slide into oblivion and Earth’s terrible and untimely demise. How ballsy is that, but apparently the creative journey felt complete at that point.

VioLution – with its title’s play on as much as four individual words “evolution”, “violent”, “evil” and “revolution” – is the band’s most dense record sonically. These are nine tracks all attempting to depict the end, the apocalypse, by combining the drum machine rhythms ranging from blasting to frozen doom, all wrapped around disharmony bent chords out of which the surprising meandering melodies emerge unexpectedly. Here – the complex picture of an album all described in one unfathomably long sentence. My words probably seem as unfitting together as the original material itself, but the purpose was clearly chosen and clearly achieved – the listener had to be made uncomfortable, wiggling on the edge of his/her seat, yet firmly mesmerized in place, awed by the size of the upcoming tragedy, just like a rabbit or chick facing into the eye of a cobra.

In this sense the surprising underlying melodic nature of VioLution is what makes the record uniquely complete. Fiery, burnt quick blasts of Shut it Down, persistent nervous push of World Wide Bombing Day and drilling piercing guitars coalescing into one headbobbing groove on Desert Generator are some of the examples of VioLution disquiet. Alas, amidst the distortion, twang and sirens bent disharmony of Pattern of the Weak, the classic funeral chords and quivering synth melody reveal the human, tragic side of the world’s end. Some of these melodies have almost “see, I told you the Earth is going to die” perverted sense of joy about them (Surrender to Oblivion) or gloomy grandiose cosmic feel when nothing will ever matter anymore (When Entropy Decreases). Amidst all of the doom and despair, those melodies, surprisingly again, offer a sense of cleansing and new beginning, even if the new roots will be sown into the ruins of the old destroyed world.

V:28 throws at us the variety of extreme vocals, some of them distorted and processed beyond recognition, some chilling spoken words. Multitalented Garm offers his clean voice towering over the composition in The Absolute. This myriad of voices serves as if the whole world is speaking about the planet’s impending downfall, all at the hands of mankind. Interestingly, a lot of the VioLution compositions move in the form of a hockey stick, with the track’s culmination coming at the very end. Surrender to Oblivion is one of the few compositions shaped as a Gaussian curve, with its peak emerging before the frozen end takes over.

VioLution is not an easy record to grasp upon the first listen, and I am sure Kristoffer Oustad has intended it this way. With time, however, uncovering melodic gems underneath industrial chill has become a personal treat for me, and I hope you can follow the path. All the while remembering that V:28 has come to the end of theirs.