Nechrist

Nokturnal Mortum
Nokturnal Mortum at Hell Fast Attack 2015
Background information
Origin	Kharkiv, Ukraine
Genres	Symphonic black metal, Folk metal, Pagan metal
Years active	1994–present
Labels	No Colours, Nuclear Blast, Oriana Music
Associated acts	Temnozor, Aryan Terrorism, Astrofaes, Drudkh, Hate Forest
Website	www.nokturnal-mortum.com
Members	Knjaz Varggoth Jurgis Bairoth Rutnar
Past members	Saturious Haarquath Munruthel Wortherax Sataroth Karpath Vrolok Alzeth Odalv K Astargh Aywar

Nokturnal Mortum is a Ukrainian black metal band from Kharkiv. One of the founders of Ukrainian black-metal scene.

Nokturnal Mortum originally started as a death metal band called Suppuration in 1991, then turned to black metal and changed name to Crystaline Darkness but "had to change the name back in 1993/94 to Nocturnal Mortum because there already existed a band with that name in western underground." Then the band "changed a letter so that we wouldn't find a band with the same name again like it was the case with Crystaline Darkness." Nokturnal Mortum gained their first Western recognition with the release of their album Goat Horns, their second full-length album, notable for having two keyboardists play on the album, often on the same song, and for mixing traditional Ukrainian music with black metal.

The band's first albums were released through The End Records and (as licence pressings) through Nuclear Blast, but the label and the band separated after releasing the album Nechrist and a re-release of the Lunar Poetry demo due to a disagreement. According to Varggoth, "We had a contract with The End Records but it was broken. We have different points of view. They didn't like our policy, we didn't like the way they do business. They owe us some money. That was enough for a conflict."

In autumn of 2014 band frontman Knjaz Varggoth (real name Yevhen Gapon, Ukrainian: Євген Гапон) published the statement declaring that he and Nokturnal Mortum was out of politics in order to avoid rumors concerning his personal views and band ideology.

In the beginning, the band still described their music as a "Lunar Black Metal". In the cover of "Lunar Poetry," he demanded the killing of the Christians, the destruction of their churches, and the return to the gods of their fathers, and described Lord Jesus Christ as "crucified hippie". From the EP Marble Moon on, the band showed an open nationalsocialist sentiment, with the use of swastikas in the logo of the band and on the cover of To the Gates of Blasphemous Fire. On the album Нехристь (NeChrist), this was also shown in texts like "The Call of Aryan Spirit". In interviews, appearances, and on their website, the band revealed their sentiments and their music itself as "Paganism NSBM". Statements and texts show neo-völkischer as well as neopaganism ideas, and on some albums a tendency to the ariosophy or a prominence of the population of cultural Europe as Aryan. In 2008, the band's singer and guitarist, Knjaz Varggoth, claimed that he had no interest in political tendencies and had never viewed Nokturnal Mortum as a political band. Yet, his ideology and the lyrics of the album Weltanschauung published in 2005 were influenced by the writings of the esoteric Hitlerist and holocaust denial Miguel Serrano.