The sound of Rite of Dionysus is informed by the whirlwind of 2022 and comes forth from the same sessions that birthed the band’s previous album Of Darkness and Light. That year included a surreal summer that saw Johannes and frontman Kjetil Nernes share the stage at Wembley for the Taylor Hawkins tribute concert. Nernes himself has spoken of an intangible rockstar-proximity effect and how powerful the whole experience felt. The impact of that shared outpouring of love and grief is one of many components that inform the album’s strange alchemy of grandeur and vulnerability.
Rite of Dionysus is an album that sees Årabrot wrestle with loss, transformation, and introspection. It deals with the realities of life for the band and although it may be challenging for some, it has a potency that will likely shimmy past any initial defences. That creeping, almost ritualistic quality is established from the very beginning with opener ‘I Become Light’ — a measured, hypnotic piece that lures you into the record’s atmosphere as if slipping into a trance.
As its title would suggest, the album’s impact rests on dualities: Melvins-infused fuzz and crystalline beauty; oppressive density and the lightness of air. ‘A Different Form’ pushes into glam-inflected territory, its Bowie-esque leanings and dextrous vocal delivery, along with the spacey production and lush guitars, showcasing a band unafraid to welcome the sunlight into their darkest corners. ‘Rock’n’Roll Star’ offers one of the album’s most affecting refrains — a gorgeous, spectral melody that clings on long after the track fades, a reminder of Årabrot’s talent for weaving the haunting into the heartfelt.
“In the wake of the ascension, the album embraces darker, infernal territory with ‘The Satantango’, its heavy, ominous tones offset by layered vocals that render it strangely beautiful, and bleakly invigorating.”
Photo Credit:
The centrepiece, however, is ‘Pedestal’, the album’s standout single and a testament to the band’s openness to chance and change. Sketched almost as a throwaway idea, it could have become a dirge or a ballad. Instead, Johannes and Årabrot’s other half, Karin Park, reimagined it as something sharper and, perhaps, more emotionally resonant. Even the lyrics transformed: initially a meditation on collapse, they shifted — inspired by Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra — into a narrative of ascension. What was to be a track built around the image of a collapsing pedestal came, instead, to be centred on a rising pedestal. The resulting composition is complemented immaculately by perfectly judged strings and percussion, and the shattering existential struggle in Nernes’ lines:
“I am the man whose life and soul are torture
I am the old man failure
But if I could I would wade in the water
And I would climb that rock
I’m on a pedestal
I’m on a pedestal
A rising pedestal”
Followed directly by Karin Park’s heartstopping refrain:
“The heavens roar
The heavens roar.”
In the wake of the ascension, the album embraces darker, infernal territory with ‘The Satantango’, its heavy, ominous tones offset by layered vocals that render it strangely beautiful, and bleakly invigorating. At its most straightforwardly personal, Rite of Dionysus pares everything back to ‘Mother’, a spoken-word piece in which Nernes intones: “Mother, your refractive love is a reflection inside me. It shines within me.” It’s a moment of stripped-back intimacy that slows the pace and further demonstrates the near undefinable nature of this band.
By the time Rite of Dionysus draws toward its close, it is clear that this is not an album built for immediacy. It asks for patience, persistence, and presence. But for those willing to step into its ritual, Årabrot deliver something affecting, atmospheric, and enduring.