Greetings feral maniacs,
Well, Sever made it about 3 years and 4 months as an 'anonymous artist'.
The gig is up, I've been exposed and - since I've done nothing that I'm ashamed of or have any reason to feel even remotely guilty about, I'll confirm the rumor: I am Blake “Azentrius” Judd of Nachtmystium. The infamous boogey man of black metal internet turd lore.
There's been rumors circulating since the earliest days of the project (but most were successfully misdirected from….) that I may have been involved, and I'm absolutely (no longer) the only person involved…..the line up of Sever is intended to be a mystery to a certain degree no matter what….but the earliest formation of the band was absolutely me….or an ‘alter ego’ of me, anyways….as everything about SEVER is different than Nachtmystium, Hate Meditation or anything I did with Twilight.
I started SEVER for multiple reasons....part of it was spiteful vengeance. I shopped my anonymous demo with zero social media presence or any other "shoulders to stand on" / affiliations to lay claim to. I decided I'd start by shopping the demo to the labels who printed (or sold) the t-shirts with my face on them 12 years ago when I was in jail. Remember? The “BlakeCrush” / Deathlike Silence Productions-inspired design with my mugshot….forever immortalizing it and making it something I have to deal with forever….yeah, well, I never forget. This is an example of just how true that fact is.
I sent the demo to the three labels I remember being involved in this and....wouldn't you know it, the first email I sent got a reply and our debut 2022 demo tape 'Sadistic Sorcery' came out on German label Iron Bonehead Productions. (the demo tape + the digipak CD + debut LP black and clear/ black smokey vinyl are still available and I encourage ANY Nachtmystium fan in Europe to be sure to grab one or both releases from Iron Bonehead directly. https://ironbonehead.de Contrary to people on the other side, I've got nothing but good things to say about Sever's first label partner. In fact, we hope he'll write after this ‘confession’ after trying to avoid it for years, can have a laugh with us about motives, but the undeniable reality is that SEVER is a potent black metal project, totally different than anything I've ever done.
I was so shocked that this had worked out (and not to mention excited to be challenged with the weirdest challenge I've ever faced: "try to write a record that sounds like you didn't write it or sing on it or play on it". ) that I quickly wrote and recorded a 6 track, 45 minute debut album in released in Apriil 2023 called 'At Midnight, By Torch Light'. This and the demo tape were both mastered by VJS of Demoncy / Nightbringer / Sargeist at his studio, Dirge Forge, over in Belgium.
For the record, I never accepted a single penny for an advance, I turned down 50% of the royalties offered to me (and took merchandise instead of a cash payment, I was offered both.) I then told IBP to "give the other half to a young, inspired band that you'd never normally invest that money into and make their day"...that's a true story. No idea if anything came of it, but I absolutely said it via an email.
Then, I proceeded to make two wholesale purchases of additional CD and vinyl copies of the debut album + copies of the IBP version of the demo tape, totaling about $1300. I was happy to do it as I was grateful someone - even an unlikely teammate - was willing to take my totally unknown work and believe in it so much!
This was all strategic in the event anyone ever got butt-hurt about any of this....this was kind of a "troll" (whilst being a completely serious music project) that has no *real* victims. What's the worst thing that happened? I gave a great label a demo and a (pretty fkn awesome) debut LP for nothing, then probably paid for a good chunk of the pressing fees in wholesale orders just incase I ever was exposed? Maybe some young band got a few hundred bucks from the label to put towards their debut that they wouldn't have gotten otherwise?
The only thing I am bummed about is that I'm confident that IBP - who told me *on many occasions* how special he thought SEVER usbm was and how he had really high hopes for the band. I would absolutely continue working with the label, but something tells me that is unlikely.....if it were to happen, my respect level for them would rise even higher than it already was. I was totally honored to be a part of that labels roster and I thank them for believing in my project. IF ANYTHING - maybe now, this will result in some record sales as it's almost impossible to get noticed as a brand new black metal band with no "big name affiliations" or some massive social media presence. Was cool to do things the old way and to be believed in by a label the way we all used to do things back in the day.
Anyways - this is on the SEVER usbm blog on the website because I don't want to post this as a social media post....too long. Will link with a hint.
Thanks for reading this. Check out 'Sadistic Sorcery' demo 2022, 'At Midnight, By Torch Light' debut LP 2023 and / or our new EP compilation 'Guero' (35 minutes, 1 new track, 1 remixed / remastered song from the debut + the 5 demo tracks, available on the major digital platforms for the first time ever.) We hope to see an LP / digipak CD pressing of this 'Guero' release in the near future. Forging new alliances as we speak....
From the Forest......
-MkX / Azentrius
SEVER OFFICIAL ONLINE PRESENCE:
https://severtemple.com
https://facebook.com/severtemple
https://instagram.com/severtemplebm
https://youtube.com/@severblackmetal
SEVER on Spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/1jSZ5tBgcj9waeR5FFrz3L?si=N9AheEt5SeCikUpAqjEZ9g
NACHTMYSTIUM PRESENCE ONLINE…
OFFICIAL BAND PAGE: https://nachtmystium.band
OFFICIAL SHOPIFY STORE: https://nachtmystium.org
https://x.com/nachtmystium666
https://facebook.com/nachtmystiumofficial
https://instagram.com/nachtmystiumofficial
https://youtube.com/@nachtmystium2025