by Niklas Göransson

From burned bridges to scorched stages, Krieg marched toward a numb farewell. Blue Miasma was shaped by ambition yet yielded no redemption, and behind it trailed the slow collapse of Blood, Fire, Death.

 

NEILL JAMESON: “Blue Miasma” was built around this grand idea of being an epic sendoff – my ultimate statement. People always dismissed KRIEG, saying things like, ‘It’s so simple; every song is just two riffs.’ Wanting to push beyond that, I decided to bring in musicians I genuinely respected.

When KRIEG gathered at Winterblut Studios in Germany in January 2005, Neill had assembled his European tour line-up: Malfeitor and Winterheart from NYKTALGIA on guitar and drums, respectively, plus Steve MetalKommand on bass.

Additionally, Werwolf from SATANIC WARMASTER replaced Akhenaten on lead guitar.

NEILL: Lauri (Werwolf) was – and still is – one of the most interesting musicians in black metal. I had a decent studio budget, so it seemed like the perfect opportunity to work with him face-to-face. Thankfully, that turned out to be a great decision; he arrived fully prepared and nailed his parts immediately.

As in, unlike other members?

NEILL: Exactly. Nothing else went as intended. The engineer, L’Hiver, kept insisting that the musicians I’d brought in were backstabbing me or sabotaging the recording, creating this totally toxic atmosphere. Flying back to Germany to have Hagen (Malfeitor) redo his guitar parts and fix Steve’s bass definitely wasn’t part of the original plan.

Malfeitor returned to Winterblut a few weeks later and re-recorded everything – this time, it went much better.

NEILL: Hagen’s first takes sounded like shit – I have no idea what went wrong. Maybe L’Hiver was right, and the focus just wasn’t there. The only person who truly gave it their all was Lauri. He came ready to fucking work, and his parts were the only ones that didn’t need redoing.

Did Akhenaten contribute at all?

NEILL: Andrew (Akhenaten) came in to help us set up but didn’t stick around. He wrote “Sick Winds…”, which we recorded for the album – but other than that, no. Everything else was composed by me, apart from the one song Lauri brought in. He mentioned having an unused BLASPHEMOUS EVIL track and suggested we adopt it; I loved that project, so I agreed.

Honestly, that song – “…And Now the End” – sounds entirely out of place to me.

NEILL: I still think it’s a great track, but in hindsight, it definitely disrupts the album’s flow. Overall, “Blue Miasma” has a slightly melodic feel with depressive, harsher sections, and this one just cuts straight through everything. Whether that’s good or bad – I’m not sure I can be objective about it.

 

In addition to the subpar guitar tracks, Neill couldn’t quite get his vocals right.

NEILL: For whatever reason, Winterblut Studios had this very dry sound that didn’t gel with my voice. I also wanted the vocals to differ from “The Black House” – those were a bit… I don’t want to say muffled; they suited the album perfectly. But “Blue Miasma” needed a clearer tone, one that allowed for a greater range.

The second leg of the “Blue Miasma” sessions took place at Studio One in Racine, Wisconsin, in late March 2005. Besides Neill re-recording vocals, Marcus Kolar from SARCOPHAGUS tracked additional basslines.

NEILL: The budget was there, and I’d long hoped to work with Marcus on at least one KRIEG album. He’d helped put together some of the earlier material and played in the live line-up for a while, so including him on a proper recording felt important. And of course, I wanted Blake to be part of it, too.

NACHTMYSTIUM frontman Blake Judd contributed guitar leads to three tracks, including “The Sick Winds Stir the Cold Dawn” – the piece Akhenaten wrote for KRIEG’s March 2003 demo, “Songs for Resistance”.

NEILL: I basically just said, ‘Hey, I’d like you to add some guitar to a few tracks’ and sent him the material. Blake was writing for “Instinct: Decay” around then, experimenting with atmospheric, layered guitar textures. He’d really hit his creative stride and introduced all these interesting ideas to “Blue Miasma”, building further upon what I’d created.

 

To commemorate the impending dissolution, KRIEG scheduled three shows on the US West Coast for June 2005. This time, the line-up featured NOCTUARY’s Joe Van Fossen and Steve Nelson on guitar and bass, along with Jef Whitehead of LEVIATHAN on drums.

NEILL: Jef really doesn’t like being around people, so it took considerable convincing. Looking back, getting him to perform publicly was genuinely special. I doubt most people who attended those shows understood how rare of an occasion they were witnessing.

Did anyone even realise who he was?

NEILL: Yeah, at the LA venue, some kid approached us, all excited, going, ‘Oh, are you Wrest?’ Jef just nodded and said, ‘Yep.’ Then the kid pulled up his sleeve, revealing a huge collection of self-inflicted wounds. He started pointing them out, like, ‘This scar came from that song, and this cut was made to that song…’

Jef would’ve loved that.

NEILL: <laughs> I’ll never forget the look on his face – sheer discomfort. He forced out a, ‘Ah, great job. Yeah, cool’, but clearly wanted to disappear. Jef appreciates his fans, sure, but he hates being put on a pedestal.

At the time, how much did you know about Gathering of Shadows, where the next show took place?

NEILL: I knew it was held on the side of a mountain, organised by the NIGHTBRINGER guys. Some of the other bands were familiar – I’d met them in passing at Milwaukee Metalfest and Sacrifice of the Nazarene Child – but what really stood out was how uniquely European the experience felt for something happening in America.

 

Gathering of Shadows was an underground black metal festival deep in the Colorado mountains. Organised by Myrddraal from BELLUM and members of NIGHTBRINGER, bands performed on a natural rock platform in the woods, powered by a generator.

The second edition – Gathering of Shadows: Cults of the Black Flame – took place in June 2005, featuring NIGHTBRINGER, IBEX THRONE, NIBIRU, NACHTMYSTIUM, KRIEG, and DEMONCY.

NEILL: I’ve seen NIGHTBRINGER elsewhere since, and they’re always excellent – but that experience was something else entirely. I’ll also never forget watching IBEX THRONE perform in the middle of the woods, on a mountain, in the height of summer… while it snowed.

DEMONCY had prepared two inverted crucifixes standing two-and-a-half metres tall, wrapped in kerosene-soaked black cloth. As they began playing, the crosses were set ablaze.

NEILL: Robert (Ixithra) had assembled a new DEMONCY line-up with VJS of INCURSUS, who would later join SARGEIST. They brought a more serious group of musicians than any other time I’d seen them. Watching DEMONCY and NIGHTBRINGER in that setting was everything I ever wanted from a live black metal experience.

Afterwards, they’d planned to drive from Colorado to San Francisco – a roughly two-day journey.

NEILL: The third date was supposed to be a warehouse gig with MORBOSIDAD and BONE AWL, but it hadn’t been promoted at all. By then, I just said, ‘Fuck it.’ Gathering of Shadows felt like the perfect final KRIEG set in the US. I wanted to keep things intimate, which is why we only did a few shows here and then three in Europe.

 

The first of KRIEG’s final European shows took place at Night for the Devoted in Kouvola, Finland. Held on July 2, 2005, it was a two-day event organised by Club Underground and featured ARCHGOAT, BAPTISM, and VITSAUS on Friday, with KRIEG, SATANIC WARMASTER, and HORNA performing on Saturday.

NEILL: If I can pat myself on the fucking back here for a moment… this was right around the time ARCHGOAT reemerged. I initially reached out because I wanted to reissue “Angelcunt” on Blood, Fire, Death. But once Blake caught wind of it, of course, he had to get involved.

The Blood, Fire, Death reissue of ARCHGOAT’s 1993 EP “Angelcunt (Tales of Desecration)” was co-released with Battle Kommand.

NEILL: I did everything I could to convince these guys to play their first show since reforming – and they agreed. Sharing the stage with ARCHGOAT’s comeback gig felt absolutely surreal. I mean, the brothers were still wearing their original nail gauntlets, rust flying off them and all.

At the time, the Finnish veterans had been inactive for over a decade. The Kouvola show followed their recent seven-inch, “Angelslaying Black Fucking Metal” – the first new ARCHGOAT material since “Angelcunt”.

NEILL: Experiencing all these fucking bands in that setting and meeting so many people from the Finnish scene was incredible. At the time, I genuinely believed myself to be on the way out, and nights like that made everything I’d done feel worthwhile. Just like the Belgrade show, it’s one of those moments I look back on with great satisfaction.

 

On July 7, 2005, KRIEG played in Hekelgem, Belgium, alongside local bands VERLOREN and PANZER. Video footage from the evening shows KRIEG performing two WELTMACHT songs.

NEILL: Since these were going to be the last KRIEG shows in Europe, it felt like the right moment. WELTMACHT had never been performed live, and Winterheart was always intended as the drummer – so with him already there, it made sense to close the shows like that.

The next day, Neill returned to Germany’s Under the Black Sun festival for the first time since performing there with JUDAS ISCARIOT five years earlier.

NEILL: I was blind drunk most of that weekend; I don’t even remember which other bands played. My only clear memory is wandering through the woods with Kris from VERLOREN, having a long philosophical conversation before we started drinking. Beyond that, the entire festival is a blur – I barely recall being on stage.

Did the billing of ‘last KRIEG show ever’ give you an extra incentive to go out with a bang, so to speak?

NEILL: <laughs> Yeah, it’ll sound cliché, but I had this demon I needed to exorcise. If this really was the final time KRIEG would be part of my life, I wanted to go out as violently as possible. Looking back, it’s lucky I didn’t kill someone when hurling beer bottles into the crowd as hard as I could.

I was standing in the audience as Neill wished cancer upon everyone present, hoping attendees would perish in car accidents on their way home – all while throwing glass bottles. Alas, one of them landed on the sound tent, leaking beer onto the mixing board beneath.

NEILL: I was intoxicated and completely bewildered when the sound cut out, so I had no idea about the consequences of my actions. Given the heavy rain, I initially assumed that caused the outage. Nobody explained what had actually happened until I got off stage.