Manes, the Norwegian explorers of black metal-and-beyond are back! Work on new material, potential live appearances and their signing to Debemur Morti Productions were recently announced.
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Manes’ history has been one of constant change. Formed in 1993, the band started out with the early second wave of black metal. Ten years later, enter album-dynamite “Vilosophe”; Manes have changed their sound into something resembling experimental electronic dance music with despair in high doses. The band put out new music for the last time in 2007 with their trip-hop influenced “How the World Came to an End”. After that, they released a lot of compilations and rarities, before officially splitting up in 2011… To the great surprise and joy of their fans, now they’re they’re back, working on new material. On their comeback, the band writes:
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“We’re full of get-up-and-go vigour, and we’re something like 700% more active than when we were not. We’ve got two releases more or less ready to be unveiled, and more info about both will come as soon as dates and cover and stuff is ready. We’ve also started to consider doing some select gigs here and there, and we’ve assembled the crew from around the Vilosophe-album to realise this venture. If everything goes according to plan, we’ll be able to announce some concerts too, in the not so distant future.”
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Prior to new material, a compilation will be released, courtesy of Debemur Morti. “Teeth, Toes and other Trinkets” will feature alternative versions of songs from their un-metal period. Nothing commercial here, though! The band comments: “Before we truly come back to life with MANES, we figured we’d dig up some dead stuff for everyone to enjoy. This is a collection of odds and ends that on the surface might seem to appeal mostly to the most die-hard completist, but listening to it ourselves we find it works surprisingly well on its own. It is at times very lo-fi and not at all polished, but swamped in atmosphere and nostalgia, at least for us”.
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Debemur Morti Productions announced the band as part of their fodder early October 2013. Regarding this co-operation and their current sound, the band writes: “We have always stated, to the tiresome, that experimentation and exploration are central in what makes Manes tick, and Debemur Morti only seems to want to nurture this fact. We still work in a void bereft of most expectations and genre limitations, at least we like to think we do, so they might be in for a ride”.
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Looking forward to that!
