On a dim October night, the walls of the Mod Club trembled beneath a convergence of spiritual ferocity and ancient grief, a ritual of sound led by Gudsforladt, Dödsrit, and Blackbraid.
Each act carved their name into the night with a distinct form of blackened transcendence: one rooted in reverence, one in ruin, and one in reclamation.
Gudsforladt
The Sacred Hymns of Desolation
Righteous, pure, and unflinchingly true to form, Gudsforladt opened the night with a haunting, pastoral melancholy. Their sound feels like it was unearthed from some forgotten chapel buried beneath centuries of sorrow; majestic, measured, yet devastatingly human.
Each note felt like confession, their frontman channeling anguish into ascension.
Setlist:
- Ride Forever in the Shadow of the Mountain
- The Criminal and His Willing Sacrifice in Repentance
- The Tower of the Moon
- Heads Bowed in Silent Prayer
- Friendship, Love and War (Valinor’s Canon)
By the time the final track faded, the crowd stood hushed, not out of stillness, but reverence. The air was heavy, as though sanctified by grief.
Dödsrit
Where Melancholy Meets Ruin
Emerging from the Swedish-Netherlands black metal underground, Dödsrit delivered an unrelenting torrent of atmosphere and aggression. Their sound melds the bleak grandeur of Scandinavian black metal with the emotional weight of melodic and post-black textures, harsh yet deeply human
Through waves of distortion and ritual flame, they forged communion through chaos, crafting moments that felt both apocalyptic and liberating. The room became a storm, guitar leads weaving like serpents through smoke, bodies moving not to a rhythm but to the collapse of it.
Setlist:
- Irjala
- Shallow Graves
- Svart Aska
- Nocturnal Fire
- Celestial Will
Blackbraid
The Witch Hawk Ascends
Headlining the night, Blackbraid, the Solo Adirondack Black Metal project delivered a performance that transcended genre. His presence was commanding, primal, and deeply spiritual; every song a ritual, every scream an invocation.
Blackbraid III, his latest offering, continues to intertwine ancestral reverence with fury, confronting the colonial scars etched into the land. To witness it live is to feel history reawakened, pain transformed into power.
The stage glowed in purple light, the air thick with incense and tension. Between roars and atmospheric interludes, Black Braid reminded the crowd what it means to carry a lineage within a genre built on rebellion.
Setlist:
- Wardrums at Dawn on the Day of My Death
- The Spirit Returns
- The Wolf That Guides the Hunters
- Moss Covered Bones on the Altar of the Moon
- The River of Time Flows Through
- The Dying Breath of a Sacred God
- Twilight Hymn of Ancient Blood
- As the Creek Flows Softly By
- Saaga
- Barefoot Ghost Dance on Blood Soaked Soil
When the final notes of Barefoot Ghost Dance on Blood Soaked Soil reverberated through the venue, the crowd wasn’t cheering—they were witnessing.
What Blackbraid brings to the stage is not mere performance, it is reclamation. A merging of ancestral spirit and sonic violence, reminding the world that black metal can still be sacred and deeply human.
Closing Thoughts
This wasn’t just a show, it was a gathering of tribes beneath a storm of distortion.
From Gudsforladt’s sorrowful hymns to Dödsrit’s relentless decay, and finally to Blackbraid’s cultural resurrection, each act offered a different form of communion.
In a world where black metal often forgets its roots in rebellion and raw expression, this tour resurrected its spirit; pure, unfiltered, and unrepentantly alive.
