Carpathian Forest is a Norwegian black metal band formed by Nattefrost and Nordavind in 1992.
Solefald is a Norwegian avant-garde metal/black metal band that was formed by members Lars Are "Lazare" Nedland and Cornelius Jakhelln in August 1995, with Nedland singing and playing keyboard/synthesizer/piano and drums, and Jakhelln singing and playing guitar and bass. The duo experiment with a wide array of musical styles, frequently work on other projects, and rarely perform live under the Solefald name, leading them to describe themselves as "two stubborn goats pretending to be a band." According to the duo, their name is an Old Norse word for "sunset," taken from one of Theodor Kittelsen's paintings illustrating a poem of the same name by Theodor Caspari, published in the 1901 book Vintereventyr.
Brave Murder Day is the second studio album by Swedish heavy metal band Katatonia, released on 1 August 1996 by Avantgarde Music. The album created a new guitar position with Fredrik Norrman's input and features growled vocals by Mikael Åkerfeldt of Opeth.
Tormentor is a Hungarian black metal band formed in 1986 in Budapest. They recorded their first album, Anno Domini, in 1988, but were unable to release it until the end of communist rule in Hungary. The album reached Norway through the tape-trading community. Following the suicide of Per Ohlin, Mayhem invited Attila Csihar from Tormentor to join the band; he was to perform the vocals on De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. Tormentor split up in 1991. After a long break they reformed and released the more experimental Recipe Ferrum through Avantgarde Music in 2001, going on a long indefinite hiatus afterwards.
Black Shining Leather is the debut studio album by Norwegian black metal band Carpathian Forest. It was released in 1998 through Avantgarde Music, and re-issued in 2007 by Peaceville Records via digipak format.
Morbid Fascination of Death is the third studio album by the Norwegian black metal band Carpathian Forest. It was released in 2001 by Avantgarde Music, and it was the last album to feature guitarist and founding member Johnny "Nordavind" Krøvel on the band's line-up. It was also their last studio album to be released by Avantgarde before they switched to Season of Mist.
Stream from the Heavens is the only studio album by Finnish doom metal band Thergothon. It was recorded in late 1992 and released after many delays on June 15, 1994 through the Italian record label Avantgarde Music. The band had eventually disbanded a year before the release of the album. Stream from the Heavens continues the funeral doom subgenre that Thergothon pioneered with their 1991 demo Fhtagn nagh Yog-Sothoth. The album was re-issued on CD in 1999 and also in 2004 by Belgian label Painiac as a 12" LP, limited to 500 copies.
The Call of the Wood is the debut album by Italian symphonic black metal band Opera IX, released through Miscarriage Records in 1995. It would be re-released by Avantgarde Records in 2001, with two bonus tracks.
The Black Opera: Symphoniæ Mysteriorum in Laudem Tenebrarum is the third studio album by Italian symphonic black metal band Opera IX, released in 2000 through Avantgarde Music. In this album, Opera IX drops some of their doom metal influences, heading to a more gothic-influenced instrumentation. This would also be the last album by Opera IX to feature Cadaveria on vocals and Flegias/Marcello Santos on drums; they would leave the band in the following year.
Avantgarde Music is an Italian record label, formed as a continuation of Obscure Plasma Records, focusing on black and doom metal artists. The label had a sub-label called Wounded Love Records, which has released albums by Dolorian and Taake. A new sub-label, Flowing Downward, had been founded in 2018, specializing in atmospheric black metal bands specifically.
Unholy was a Finnish avant-garde doom metal band. Formed in 1988, they were one of the first doom metal groups in their home country.
Lifelover was a Swedish band formed in 2005 by Jonas Bergqvist and Kim Carlsson in Stockholm. Following six years of activity the group split up in September 2011 after the death of Bergqvist, as he was the lead composer and one of Lifelover's founding members. While widely considered being metal, Lifelover combined several genres into their sound, citing black metal, post-punk, dark ambient, doom metal and gothic rock among other influences. The band called their music "narcotic metal", which was described in a Decibel interview with Carlsson where he stated "anyone should be able to figure that out [what that means] or make their own conclusion about it."
Nightwork is the third studio album by the Swedish black metal band Diabolical Masquerade released in 1998 through Avantgarde Music.
Forgotten Tomb is an Italian metal band from Piacenza. It was founded in 1999 by Ferdinando "Herr Morbid" Marchisio as a one-man black metal project after the disbanding of his previous black metal band Sacrater. The lyrical themes of the band's early albums revolve mostly around depression and suicide, while the recent albums' lyrics deal with negativity and nihilism.
Gehenna is a Norwegian black metal band.
Neonism is the second studio album by Norwegian avant-garde metal band Solefald. It was released on 7 December 1999, through Avantgarde Music.
Azaghal is a Finnish black metal band, currently signed to Moribund Records. They were established in 1995.
Originators of the Northern Darkness is a tribute album to the Norwegian black metal band Mayhem, with contributions from some of the leading bands in the black metal and death metal scenes. All the songs were recorded between 1998 and 2000 in various locations, and the album was released on CD in 2001 by Avantgarde Music. In addition to the regular CD, a limited edition CD in black leather was also released. The album was re-released on digipack CD in 2007 by Peaceville.
Darkspace is a Swiss ambient black metal band from Bern, considered to be a pioneer of the cosmic subset therein.
Vargnatt is the debut demo tape by Norwegian black metal band Ulver, issued in 1993 independently. The cassette was limited to 200 hand-numbered copies. The demo was self-produced by Ulver, and recorded in the Norwegian trollforest between 15 and 17 October 1993. This is the only release to feature guitarists Reza and Grellmund, and drummer Czral, as they had left after the new year.
