Ulvesang: Nova Scotia’s Duo Explore Feelings of Isolation, Mental Health and Melancholy

Ulvesang is a neofolk/dark-folk band from the majestic area of Nova Scotia in Canada. The duo combines ambient ritual soundscapes with a liberatory vision for the planet and humanity.

Rather than the sound of industrial influenced neofolk bands seen so often within the genre, Alex Boyd and Ana Dujaković create soothing tracks inspired by the traditional folk melodies. Together, they explore the nature, mental health, and our role as fragile souls within the grand scheme of things. Ulvesang’s meditative ambience uses the imagery of nature not to romanticize an imaginary glorious past, but to heal both personal trauma and societal ills. The duo’s uncompromising antifascist stance is also a breath of fresh air in a scene so often associated with reactionary elements.

So, where did it all begin and how did you get together? Were you involved with any other musical projects prior to Ulvesang?

We had known each other as friends for several years and had similar tastes in many styles of music. We eventually discussed if either one of us would be interested in trying to play some neofolk/dark-folk sometime, as we were really the only two of our social group who were fans of the music, and that was the catalyst for what became Ulvesang.

Ana had played in a number of projects over the years and for Alex this has been his only true “active” musical project outside of just aimless jam sessions with friends.

Can you define what terms like dark-folk, industrial or neofolk mean for you? What attracts you the most in this kind of musical expression? Tell me about your main influences.

How “technical” or academic do we want to get? Industrial is a genre developed by Throbbing Gristle in the 1970s and existed as an even more deconstructed reaction to what they felt was a commercializing punk scene.

Most early, and in our opinion, genuine “industrial” music plays with abrasive, unconventional sound structure and instrumentation and focused mostly on unpleasant elements of the human psyche. Over time it became the more “danced-up” 4-on-the-floor electro-industrial most people think of now. Our personal preference is for the more grating, abrasive industrial, but anything Skinny Puppy recorded from ’92 and earlier is excellent. Dark-Folk and Neofolk are what are considered “post-industrial” genres. The progenitors of the scene were often tangentially related to the early industrial scene, but the sound is considerably different.

There are not a lot of bands we would list as clear influences as most of what we truly feel influenced by is not necessarily part of the neo/dark-folk “scene”. Coil and SWANS. Obviously Agalloch is present in our sound. Michael Cashmore’s guitar playing with Current 93 is there as well. And of course, the spirit of black metal. We have always been interested in finding new forms of musical expression and our tastes run to darker forms of expression.

Ulvesang hails from Nova Scotia, in what ways has the place where you live or grown up shaped the world to you as artists? I’m curious to learn more about the history, nature and the politics of your place of origin.

Nova Scotia is a peninsula on the eastern coast of Canada. It is largely surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean and has a surprising variety of topography and geographical beauty in a small area. Highlands in Cape Breton, the Annapolis Valley, and of course the many coastal areas that bring sea air and fog. It is an economically disadvantaged province outside of the city of Halifax for the most part. There is harsh weather and many areas of true isolation. Much of the natural beauty of Nova Scotia is an influence our sound. Nova Scotia is the home of the Mi’kmaw people, who are a First Nations people indigenous to this land and the other Atlantic provinces and surrounding areas.

Ana’s family name sounds very Yugoslavian and the last track on The Hunt is called “Močvara / Мочвара”. Do you have any family ties to Yugoslavia and anything to do with the wars during the ‘90s? Have you studied anything on Balkan history and what’s your view on issues like nationality and ethnicity?

Ana: I was born in SFR Yugoslavia and my family moved as refugees to Canada because of the civil war at the time. Nationalism isn’t something I am a fan of, it tends to lead to a lot of issues like xenophobia, racism, etc. I think we are seeing nationalism on the rise all over the world and it tends to be accompanied by right and far-right political stances and ideologies. We try and speak out against it when we can.

What is it like to take a stance against the fascist creep from within the neofolk community?

This is a difficult question to answer concisely. We think that most people who discover genres like neofolk, dark-folk, black metal, or other forms of fringe, post-industrial music, have a tendency toward being outsiders, “rebellious”, contrarian, or otherwise people who sit outside what is viewed as “the mainstream”. We think that if we consider this, it is easy to understand why genuinely negative, but ultimately “countercultural” political expressions like fascism can spread and become a point of interest for people. Many people are/were attracted to the “taboo” or “transgressive” aesthetic of bands of this type and often claim to seek the feeling they get from the shock value of it. This was always evident in the “scene” but was often ignored in an effort to “separate the art from the artist”.

We felt that in the time just before the political events of 2016, and the subsequent socio-political fallout, the fascist element was truly emboldened to focus itself as a recruitment tool for the cause. This made it ultimately impossible for us to simply fence-sit or pretend there wasn’t a problem worth targeting. We’ve always been leftists. It became important to openly differentiate ourselves as a leftist, antifascist neofolk/dark-folk band specifically because so little existed with that will to push back against a fascist, or at least tacitly “apolitical”, wave within the scene.

We want people to know that there are genuinely antifascist bands who make this kind of music and hope to inspire more people to do the same and help grow a larger foothold in the scene.

What’s your take on the so-called censorship and canceling artists because of their affiliations to right-wing themes and imagery? Where do we draw the line between overtly NSBM and fash artists and more left-wing adjacent people in the past like GISM’s Sakevi Yokoyama or Sleep and High On Fire’s Matt Pike obsession with David Icke and conspiracy theories? What about Boyd Rice and his influence on the underground scene?

We think the notion of “canceling artists” or censorship in the Internet age is nonsense. Fascists and their supporters gripe constantly about being “cancelled” and yet anything they do, record, release or say is widely available to any other interested fascist at the click of a button. If anything, it only bolsters their cred within fascist or fascist adjacent circles and further radicalizes those who simplify the entire argument down to attacks on their “right to speech”. People continue to have unrestricted free-expression here. The only difference is we are now much more comfortable calling out assholes for holding dangerous, shitty belief systems and by we are by no means obligated to respect those belief systems or the people who hold them. And we can take a certain pleasure in very actively disrespecting them. Most fascists also hate communism/socialism/anarchism etc. and by extension support a capitalist system. Under this system, by definition, absolutely no corporation or entity is required to platform people with bullshit opinions. Fascists are often too stupid to understand this however and somehow blame anything other than the system they support.

David Icke is a dimwit. Sleep, and Matt Pike, probably buried enough weed in their time to have lost the plot enough to buy into his brand of batshit. Boyd Rice is what he is: an edgy, comfortable Social Darwinist, an obvious supporter of fascist ideologies and an early fringe-industrial artist. He’s a middling artist at best, and there will always be people in the scene who praise him despite the parade of absolutely ridiculous and hateful shit he’s pulled over the years. If that’s what you value in an artist, then our value systems are very different.

Do you have a genuine interest in the occult and what aspects of the esoteric knowledge and spiritual communities do you feel closest to your ethics and politics? In what ways can the occult provide a liberatory experience for people interested in radical politics?

Alex: I was a practicing occultist for nearly two decades. My primary focus was a post-modern branch of “occultism” referred to as “Chaos Magick”. I moderated a large community on it for a number of years and was actively involved during that time. I do not consider myself to be an active member of any occult/spiritual community at this time.

A core tenet of what I practiced was the adoption and study of multiple spiritual paradigms and mythos, including the invention of one’s own. A primary goal being the understanding that any, and all, forms of practice ostensibly achieve the same goals: a state of “gnosis” and the intention to affect some form of transformation in the world of the practitioner… in my opinion, this was primarily an internal transformation.

A critical goal was the tearing down of “blood and soil” bullshit and illustrating why these elements, and mental crutches, were unnecessary baggage that could be discarded once the tools to achieve a gnostic state were learned. I worked with many systems. The Elder Futhark and the Nordic mythos were very practical and easily relatable paradigm for me for a long time, but I found the communities surrounding those ideas to be guilty of exclusionary bullshit far more often than not. Not everybody who works with runes or Norse iconography is inherently racist, but from experience; I met far too many people who were perfectly comfortable holding racialist views and being the stereotype they claimed they weren’t.

People were the driving catalyst for my shift away from open occultism.

Are there any particular books, movies, personal experiences or anything else that informed you on these subjects? Can you recommend some good literature?

Alex: Many. I will not describe my experiences here.

As for literature, I would name a few basics:

• Phil Hine—“Prime Chaos”
• Genesis P Orridge/Tempel ov Psychick Youth—“Thee Grey Book” and “Thee Psychick Bible”
• Peter Carrol—“Liber Null & Psychonaut”

I was listening to your latest album The Hunt during the Covid pandemic. How important are topics like isolation, melancholy and mental health in your creative output? Is there an underlying story with each of your records, or are they used just to create a particular ambience for the listening experience?

Ana: Isolation, mental health and melancholy are absolutely a part of Ulvesang. We each deal with mental illness and try to express it in a way that others can connect with or feel comforted by.

Both albums hold personal significance for us, but we want our listeners to project their own story onto what they connect with and we greatly prefer that outcome anyway. Covid during 2020 and 2021 was an extremely isolating time for me in particular as I am physically disabled and at a high-risk of Covid complications. It was a time where I had to basically be paranoid about my life for two years, daily. We know a lot of other people who also felt increased isolation and stress as well due to the risks of gathering, lockdowns, restrictions, inaccessibility to vaccines or social supports or programs and worsening mental health, and not being able to see or visit friends and family/loved ones.

The artwork on both of your records is really beautiful. How important is the visual representation of your work for you?

Alex: I think we want to present an image that reflects our sound. We are lucky to have an artist who does this very well for us.

In 2021, you were working on a split with Ashera, who are very political and anticapitalist in their approach to lyrics and spreading the message. Is “A Blaze Ansuz” website, facebook group and Antifascist Neofolk Compilations the best way to find out new music like this?

Ana: We have a ton of recommendations and it would be a lengthy list. We think A Blaze Ansuz and Left/Folk are a great place to start digging as well as the other antifascist groups/channels on YouTube and Facebook.

This interview was originally published in the third issue of Bulgarian fanzine Svetlo Budeshte.