{"id":540593,"date":"2026-07-23T16:59:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-23T16:59:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/540593\/"},"modified":"2026-07-23T16:59:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-23T16:59:08","slug":"meet-ysbrydnos-the-mystery-project-putting-wales-on-the-black-metal-map","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/540593\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet Ysbrydnos: the mystery project putting Wales on the black metal map"},"content":{"rendered":"

Doing for Cymru what Darkthrone\u2019s A Blaze In The Northern Sky and Immortal\u2019s Sons Of Northern Darkness once did so territorially for Norway, Ysbrydnos\u2019s latest album, Welsh Mythical Darkness, drives another blade deep in the black metal<\/a> map.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a declaration,\u201d claims the project\u2019s inscrutable architect, Ysbryd. \u201cA statement that Wales and its legends are to be celebrated. For the last few years, I\u2019ve been using Ysbrydnos as a vehicle to forge personal connections with the Welsh landscape, and this album revisits places important to me, such as Twmbarlwm in Risca and Carmarthen, tying them to fictional versions of their histories.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Ysbryd\u2019s treatments of his country\u2019s past owe much to the visionary approaches of author-cum-mystics such as Alan Moore and late Welsh supernaturalist Arthur Machen.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThese guys use local legends to create their narratives,\u201d Ysbryd explains. \u201cI hope to remind people that magic is alive in the everyday, in nature and in the places where we live.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fully conscious of the problematic relationships between myth, history and nationalism, Ysbryd is quick to distance himself from \u201cthe flag-waving, beer-bellied fascists using \u2018pride\u2019 as a synonym for intolerance\u201d.<\/p>\n

Instead, enhanced by folkish melodies and dungeon synth atmospherics, his fantastical tales \u2013 full of wraith-inhabited castles, blood-harvesting hobgoblins and cryptids descended from Madoc, a 12th-century Welsh prince \u2013 conjure an alternative medievalism doubling as allegories in support of a marginalised people.<\/p>\n

\u201cTracks such as A Fallow Harvest focus on divisions between rich and poor, exposing the myth of menial work as the peasant\u2019s lot in life,\u201d explains Ysbryd.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWelsh Mythical Darkness is a rallying cry for Welsh culture \u2013 a haunted shriek boldly proclaiming that even after being invaded, our language being banned and every effort being made to remove local culture from the minds of people, we still exist, and are proud to be Welsh.\u201d<\/p>\n

This article was originally published in Metal Hammer issue 415, July 2026. Welsh Mythical Darkness is out now.<\/p>\n

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