Nordic Giants are truly one in a million. Their finely tuned compositions matched with an engrossing live experience has helped them turn heads and draw attention from all corners of the scene. A duo of EPs in the form of ‘Build Seas’ and ‘Dismantle Suns’ laid the footwork for something special, but it is on their full-length debut ‘A Séance Of Dark Delusions’ that they are looking to eclipse everything and produce something truly memorable.

Nordic Giants gleam brightest within the unspoken storytelling of their music. Each track they conjure is sculpted with intense precision, perfectionistic care and wholehearted purpose; and rather than forcing a direct theme down your throat everything is left open to interpretation. Where some may hear hope, others may hear heartbreak. Where some hear devastation, others may hear expansion. This complex openness is what sets the band miles apart from their peers. Opener ‘Elysian Dreams’ creeps in before ‘Evolve Or Perish’ questions the integrity of human existence over a bed of whirling drums and daunting keys, and ‘Rapture’ howls and spins with gorgeous flourishes as the vocals of Beth Cannon soars higher than mountains. Every note is as vital as the last and every second is there for a reason.

The imagery the band seamlessly conjures up throughout the release is daunting to say the least as well. Endless rainbows of colour and flashes of light fill the mind as ‘Illuminate’ rings clear with deep keys and floating vocals while ‘Futures Dark’ skips about with trembling pop beats. The deep horns and ambient textures of ‘Black Folds’ leak into the haunting crescendo of ‘A Thousand Lost Dreams’, which concludes the whole performance with vigorous feeling and lingering awe.

It’s a special thing when a band can sound completely different over every track they create and still bring them together to work in perfect harmony and from start to finish. Nordic Giants have put together a journey of the senses, a real hairs-on-the-back-of-your-neck moment spread across 40 mesmerizing minutes.

Truly trying to put into the words the emotions that Nordic Giants bring to life on ‘A Séance Of Dark Delusions’ is really rather difficult. Their music is inspiring, stirring, heartbreaking and universally soaring in equal measure, and is still as engrossing on the tenth listen as it was on the first. Only every once in a while do a band come along and create music that embodies what it means to be human so thoroughly, honestly and purely. Nordic Giants are that band. It doesn’t get much better than this.

4.5/5

‘A Séance Of Dark Delusions’ by Nordic Giants is out now on Kscope.

Nordic Giants links: Website|Facebook|Twitter|Bandcamp

Words by Jack Rogers (@JackMRog)