Zephyrous

Zephyrous — Ivar Enger, born in Norway in 1973 — was Darkthrone's guitarist in the phase that defined Norwegian black metal. He was in the band from the initial line-up, when the group still played technical death metal, and crossed the radical turn that produced A Blaze in the Northern Sky (1992) and Under a Funeral Moon (1993) — the two albums on which Darkthrone abandoned clean production and technical complexity for a raw, deliberately primitive sound. His function in that context is particular. The riffs of that phase are long, repetitive, played in continuous tremolo and without dynamic variation: the hypnotic effect depends precisely on the refusal to resolve or develop. Playing that demands physical constancy and a willingness to give up everything normally prized in a guitarist. He left the band in 1993, and since then Darkthrone has operated as a duo, with Fenriz and Nocturno Culto recording all the instruments. He remained away from the music scene in the decades that followed.