RITUAL WITH ANATOLY PAKHALENKO
Let’s start with the fact that our band Nytt Land is a little more than a creative team, no matter how banal it may sound at first glance. If you study the biography of the Nytt Land, for example, on the Wikipedia page, you will find that our creative team is a family project. Everything we create is done within our family, in constant interaction with each other. It’s cool because our music, our songs, is born in this duet. Let us do one thing, but you understand that every person is, first of all, an individual, a person with his inner world and experiences, his perception of the surrounding world and reality. And this is what is in the first place, as the foundation of our creative and family duo. We don’t separate our music from our family life, absolutely. It’s part of one whole. And that’s cool.
The album ‘Ritual’ was created a year ago. Big, holistic work has become the key for us in many ways. Natasha took over the entire creative process in working on the’ Ritual’, and I didn’t even interfere with it. It wasn’t necessary. I focused on the technical side of the implementation, allowing Natasha to embody her ideas in this album fully. And I think that’s what made the ‘Ritual’ the way it turned out. Powerful, epic and holistic. It will be very deep and mystical if you analyse the lyrics and very authentic in terms of sound, since when working on the album, we created the sound from the very beginning, without using the experience of our previous releases – it was a risk. Still, as a result, this is what created the unique sound of the ‘Ritual’.
We don’t have a button that activates the songwriting mode, and we get to work in the studio. Like most musicians, our songs are born as a result of some improvisations, sometimes old developments. Sometimes, you read some myths or epic songs, and just in one of the passages, you feel the song, its rhythm, and melody. And then you just sit down and work on its embodiment. Inspiration can be the sound of rain at night in the forest and the crackling of a fire, and the wind in the grasses of a huge, boundless steppe. This is an accident, and sometimes this inspiration is enough for an entire album at once, as in the case of a ‘Ritual’.
Eastern philosophical systems like Buddhism, with some elements of nature mysticism, are rather close to us, precisely in their sincerity and contemplative perception of life. This is both life and creativity, an inseparable part of our lives. Black Sabbath, it was them, over 25 years ago! The black magic of music and voice of that just swept me away once and for all.
This is magic, eternity. That connecting part of the universe that is beyond rational perception and expression. These are emotions and energy. I believe that it is possible to express everything in music.
https://nyttland.bandcamp.com
