Nocturnal Nightmare

A Swedish solo project before the present band

Nocturnal Nightmare began around 2012 as a Swedish depressive black-metal solo project led by Oliver Dahlbäck. Public accounts describe a project that later became an international band rather than remaining fixed in its original one-person form.

Contemporary reviews place the project’s beginning around 2011 or 2012 and identify Oliver Dahlbäck, later associated with Black Lion Records, under the name Lucian as founder. Sources disagree on the exact year, so the chronicle uses an approximate period rather than manufacturing a precise date. Grotesk joined soon afterward as vocalist and guitarist, while Lucian later left.

Lucian, Grotesk and a long pre-album period

The early years established a conventional DSBM foundation. A decisive change came with the addition of musicians from Sweden and Italy, including Francesco Chissalès of Afraid of Destiny as a multi-instrumentalist. The 2020 single Skuggvarelsen documented the developing line-up before the album.

The project’s personnel history is central to Abstrakt Sinne. After an earlier collaborator left in 2014, Grotesk continued alone until the Italian multi-instrumentalist Adimere joined in 2020. The resulting Sweden–Italy axis was not a marketing description but a practical recording reality: music was made in Treviso, while vocals were recorded across Treviso and Jönköping.

The arrival of Adimere

Abstrakt Sinne retains depressive and atmospheric black-metal language but presents a broader ensemble sound than the project’s beginnings. Long tracks, shifts between pressure and suspension, and the use of both Swedish and other linguistic perspectives give the album an identity beyond a generic solo-project template.

The decisive later change was the arrival of Italian multi-instrumentalist Francesco Chissalès, known as Adimere and connected with Afraid of Destiny. The 2020 single Skuggvarelsen demonstrated the new configuration before the album. This was not merely session support: Adimere wrote and played the instrumental body of the debut, contributed vocals to its final track and handled mixing, mastering and layout.

Abstrakt Sinne

The six-track album runs for approximately fifty-three minutes and includes Självhat, Allt och Inget, No Place for Happiness, Humanity, Skuggvarelsen and Annullamento. Contemporary sources place its release at the end of September or beginning of October 2021, a one-day platform discrepancy worth preserving in the record.

The six tracks were written and recorded between October 2020 and March 2021 and mixed and mastered the following April. Adimere is credited with all instruments and a vocal part on the closing track, while Grotesk supplies the principal vocals. Sources differ by one day, placing the edition on 30 September or 1 October 2021. This minor conflict should remain an explicit metadata question, not become a false certainty.

Abstrakt Sinne contains six long pieces and lasts 53:37. The language moves between Swedish, English and Italian titles, matching the international production. Reviews agreed on slow, depressive structures and distressed melodic writing but divided over originality and sound: one praised its emotional force, another considered it conventional, and several noted a bass-heavy or blurred drum mix. The draft records those reactions as reception, not as objective fact.

Recording between Sweden and Italy

Talheim Records Germany released Abstrakt Sinne as TRG009CD. The label connection belongs to this album; the earlier solo history should remain separately attributed.

The album record supplies an unusually exact production window. Music was written and recorded between October 2020 and March 2021; mixing and mastering followed in April. Instruments were recorded in Treviso, while voices were captured in Jönköping and Treviso. Grotesk wrote the third track and most lyrics; Adimere wrote the remaining music and the final-track lyric. J.S. supplied photography.

A debut after roughly a decade

The reviewed sources demonstrate the transformation from solo project to international group but do not provide a reliable present-day line-up or activity statement.