Once upon a time there was a magical symphonic black metal super group (try saying that 5 times fast) that spent the better half of 1998 inside my disc-man. Yeah, remember those!? Covenant originated as a two man group in 1993 with Nagash, and Blackheart , but it wasn't until they signed a deal with Nuclear Blast and released their sophomore album Nexus Polaris that they caught the attention of the entire metal world. The Album, consisting of members Nagash (Dimmu Borgir, Troll), Blackheart (Troll), Astennu (Dimmu Borgir), Sverd (Arcturus), Sarah Jezebel Deva (Cradle of Filth) and Hellhammer (Mayhem), led to the band's Norwegian Grammy nomination and eventual win, making them the first metal band in history to win a Norwegian Grammy. This had a lot to do with one simple fact, this album fucking rules!
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6mVRT50Fo4[/youtube]
So where are they now? Well unfortunately this band falls in a pile I often refer to as "one album wonders". Following the success of Nexus Polaris the band had developed all sorts of personal problems, opposing views of musical direction, learned there was another very successful electropop group from sweden of the same name, changed their name to The Kovenant after being presented with a lawsuit, fired half their members, changed their direction to industrial metal, and released Animatronic which went down in flames on my list of all time crappy follow ups. Even still, when the band toured the U.S. on the Animatronic record, I went to see them hoping to experience whatever was left from Nexus Polaris live. It was a disaster to say the least. Ultimately the band is still together, and making mediocre pop goth for the middle aged in my opinion, but they did do a Nexus Polaris reunion show last year which you can find on the internet.
