NERNES/SKAGEN

Bio:

‘...Beneath the waters is an entrance to the underworld, and NERNES/SKAGEN
are it’s guardians...’

The magnet poles in Kjetil Nernes’s guitar stack milled to the humidity in the air and toppled of waves of guitar
noise to Stian Skagen’s electronic altar.The two young men, who would become the foremost communicators of
downward-spiraled sound storms kept their first concert together in 2006.

With a trailer filled to the brink with speakers and cabinets, they rumble through a sweaty underground tour
on the U.S. east coast summer 2008. The overwhelming response from the sound hungry Americans confirmed
that the tunnel NERNES / SKAGEN was digging had something concealed within it, as it became dangerously
deeper and darker.

Back in Oslo they began the constructions of what would constitute the framework for their debut album Ad
Undas. Against a wall of microphones, amps, and cabinets, they bolted their airy vibration and drone sludge to
four structures. These four structures became their Ad Undas Album.

NERNES / SKAGEN is a hybrid duo that melts together some of the extremities on the music and soundart
scene in Norway. Nernes has his background from noise rock, where his band Årabrot has frightened and inspired
the established music scene. Artists such as Glenn Branca, Tony Conrad and Dylan Carson’s Earth are the
most important inspirations for the sound and structures he conjures in the meeting with Skagen.

Skagen comes from Oslo soundart scene, he pushes forward a soundscape based on synthesis, analogue, filters
and advanced sound constructions. Inspired by composers like Pauline Oliveros, Morton Subotnick and Ryoji
Ikeda, Skagen finds himself on the boarder of minimalism and avant-garde compositions.

This combination makes NERNES / SKAGEN to a neurological travel in man and its understanding of music.
From the lower caves and mountains, where the pure phenomenology has is rising. Creating uncontrolled vibrations
in the spinal cortex. By liberating them self from the rational, NERNES / SKAGEN seeks a sonic dualism, that challenges the
listeners’ perception and understanding of time.

When NERNES / SKAGEN enters the stage, a drone atmosphere, opens a space with the potential for a deep
listening and meditative state. Where the listener can join their journey inspired by Dante’s Inferno.
From their analogue and digital environment, their sharp fluctuations of sound waves cut through the air, pulling
the listener into to their crystal sharp sonic space.

Member Since:

Members:

KJETIL NERNES

Electrical Baritone Guiar, Fulltone OCD, Hiwatt amps and cabinets.

STIAN SKAGEN

Korg MS20 digital OSC, Samplers and effects and other sound sources.

Influences:

Sounds Like:

EUAN ANDREWS
Vinyl Round up
Rock-A-Rolla Magazine

Some serious darkwave howling on offer here from Norway’s duo of
Kjetil Nernes and Stian Skagen. Following a US tour in 2008,
their debut album together is a formidable melding of Nernes’ guitar overload
and Skagen’s electronic storm. It’s a perfect example of how noise music
is increasingly breaking down barriers between genres, utilising everything
at its disposal to create its own seething world of devastation.
Ad Undas, a double LP with one long track per side,
is wave upon black wave of Nernes’ guitar crashing,
while Skagen’s electronics provide unsettling hiss and spittle.
It’s bracing stuff, placing you in the centre of powerful elemental forces.

Record Label: