Published: February 1, 2014

So here we have the third full-length by the Iranian one-man band Ekove Efrits called Nowhere. Predecessor Conceptual Horizon took me completely by surprise with its utterly original mash-up of ambient, doom, black metal trip-hop and more and left me almost without words to describe it. So what to expect from Nowhere? Once again a lot of styles are employed, ambient, almost gothic female vocals, minimalist piano, flurries of depressive black metal, neo-classical instrumentations and more. The difference is the Nowhere is much refined, mature and simply put: better. And thats quite an achievement considering the score of 85 I gave Conceptual Horizon. The atmosphere is solemn often even sacral, but always sincere and devoid of tackiness. Rivalling even Ulver in sheer quality of the compositions, I cannot recommend this highly enough for those who have even slight interest in bands such as Manes, In The Woods or even The Gathering. Awesome stuff.