DARKTHRONE's TED 'NOCTURNO CULTO' SKJELLUM Says His New Band AVRAK Will Release Debut Album This Fall

In a new interview with Dev Gohil, DARKTHRONE's Ted "Nocturno Culto" Skjellum spoke about his emerging heavy rock project AVRAK in which he is joined by Anders Hegna of NØD, EL KAYENNE and SVIDD GREVLING. AVRAK made its live debut this past April in Norway, with the duo backed by the Kråbøl brothers, Terje Kråbøl (drums) and Stian Kråbøl (bass).

Regarding how the idea for AVRAK came about, Skjellum said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Actually, I've known this guy [Anders] for — I don't know — 12 years or something. And I knew he was in other bands. And we talked about maybe we should do something once and try it out and see what it becomes.

"We come from slightly different angles, when looking at music, but we have a lot in common. I listened to KREATOR up until '87 max, and he's likes [listening] to things from '88 and onwards. So I have a bit more old-school path. But it's fun.

"When we decided [to play together for the first time], we locked ourselves into a cabin up in the mountains for, like, five days," he added. "We had a lot of equipment with us, and we had never played together before, and let's see how this works out. And it could be after the first night that we just [say], 'Okay, this doesn't work. We are going to sit here for five more days.' But we were on to something quite early. And it's a lot of coincidences on how this is working."

On the topic of AVRAK's musical direction, Skjellum said: "On the album that we recorded in February, [Anders] has the kind of, let's say, a bit of a more rock guitar sound thing, and I have the more metal guitar sound thing, and they kind of blend together. The music is very... I mean, we play two different things almost all the time on this album, and it sounds really chaotic, but this is the hard part for us to be working with. To get this right, it takes a lot of time, and also our arrangements and small details."

He continued: "I think the AVRAK album is coming out this autumn sometime. And we're looking forward to it. For us, it's like a milestone because all the hours we put into this project, and we also played actually a concert now in late April. So, the goal for AVRAK is to play more live. I mean, we have a great band together. So, we got that confirmed in April that, yes, sure we can play live. It's no problem."

Asked how his songwriting approach for AVRAK is different from that for DARKTHRONE, Skjellum said: "Well, it's different, especially in the most obvious way, is that me and the other guitarist, we are making everything together. He doesn't live far away from me, so we have a rehearsing space down here, and we are working closely on all the details of this music. And the music itself definitely differs from DARKTHRONE because... It's a bit more classic heavy metal, hard rock. There could be some doom things there and maybe some black metal elements, but it's more of a classic — what should I say? — heavy, heavy metal kind of thing. And I think that that's kind of one of the things that makes it interesting for me because I'm a huge fan of the classic heavy metal from the '80s and stuff like that, the more optimistic decade somehow, something like that. I mean, heavy metal in the '80s was very different because the European heavy metal versus the American heavy metal was... It's very, very far away from each other because the Europeans, of course, have more history. And then their music [is] darker somehow. So the European heavy thing was — not like the party kind of thing, but it was a different thing. Yeah, I like it."

DARKTHRONE's latest studio album, "Pre-Historic Metal", came out on May 8 via Peaceville Records. The LP was recorded at Chaka Khan Studios, Oslo, with production work conducted by Ole Øvstedal, Silje Høgevold and Mads Luis. Mastering was carried out by Jack Control at Enormous Door and Maor Appelbaum Mastering.

Pioneers of a sound that changed the world. Lifelong disciples of suspense and mystery. An enigmatic duo like no other, hell-bent on haunting souls through the eternities. There are many things DARKTHRONE have been called since forming in 1986 and these are but a few, having drawn from a creative well so potent and powerful it turned them into one of Norway's biggest musical exports. Following from their debut album "Soulside Journey", the next three full-lengths, often referred to as "the unholy three", set the benchmark for black metal in the early 1990s, though in truth they've never been the kind to rest on such laurels — distilling elements of vintage punk, doom, thrash and death into their own sonic fingerprint and continuing to test that equation throughout the years. It's been quite the journey, having won cryptic pair Nocturno and Fenriz legions of loyal fans around the world.

Photo credit: Peer Olav Kittilsen (courtesy of Peaceville / Secret Service Publicity)