On Sister's Alpha and Omega: "He Comes" and "Inmost Nigredo"

In Solitude's 'Sister' has certainly been a massively striking album for many of us who have been appreciating their music throughout the years, and like it has often been mentioned, it is undeniably an album which once it has entered your soul, there it remains: growing deeper listen after listen, it keeps offering new insights and new experiences of different sides of itself every time you give it a spin.
In this brief article, we would like to specifically focus on two of the -arguably, perhaps?- most important and strongest songs on 'Sister', which happen to be the one that opens the album and the one who closes it: "He Comes" and "Inmost Nigredo".
It is perhaps not surprising that these two pieces are placed exactly where they are, as they represent two very different poles, musically, of In Solitude's creation: "He Comes" offers the acoustic, folk and bluesy side, dwelling so masterfully in a melancholic yet anticipating and allusive mood; while "Inmost Nigredo" carries the listener in an intense vortex of guitars, involving atmospheric black metal-sounding tremolo riffs here and there (delivered on the record by none other than Pelle Forsberg of WATAIN), powerful drums that seem to grab and shake you, passionate vocals that splendidly express a sort of excruciating, yet ecstatic, inner and outer breakthrough.
Both songs, in their own way, surely manage to overwhelm, captivate, and even engross their listeners: in this, they actually touch like the two extremes of a circle.
To celebrate and and homage these two magnificent songs, in this article we will collect all that has been said and explained about each one of them by In Solitude's members themselves, quoting from interviews during the years after the release of 'Sister'; we will also include here some live performances of the songs (only one available at the moment for "Inmost Nigredo" - but it is a very powerful performance).

“[…] There are certain moments in various songs that have a very special place for me. I think the opening track ‘He Comes’ is very important – that’s very strong for me. That song makes me think about the people in the band a lot, and it makes me think about my life in a special way. It reaches a special place.”
{Pelle, interview on Metal Forces Magazine; 2014}

”The guitar structure of that intro was written by Gottfrid in a cabin up north in Sweden where it’s basically dark all year long. There are no computers and no televisions up there, so you have to find other ways to get along with life. When he sent me the demo for this track, I just said: ‘this has to be in the new album!’ And eventually we re-recorded again, live, exactly like he recorded it with me playing the piano. It sounds sort of dusty and has the feeling of furniture cracking.”
{Pelle, interview on Portal do Inferno; 2013}







“[…]We have this song called ‘He comes’ that I think has something primal, which none of our other songs have. It’s the most simplistic song, but at the same time it has many doors open in that song and it has a special place in my heart.”
{Pelle, interview on The Independent Voice; 2014}







“[…]Actually the song had been there for a year or so but it was when we did all the vocals in the studio on the spot that a lot of stuff came that way, almost like improvising. In a way the vocal melody was working more like an instrument. I think it was good to keep it low to have that acoustic feel where you can hear every single instrument very clearly. It was a good move…I think.”
{Gottfrid about recording “He Comes”, interview on Power of Metal; 2014}

"It was not planned to have an acoustic track on the album. It was just this song that I wrote…I think it is the oldest one on the album. It was just a great song, that’s all. The mood was perfect for opening the album, you get the feeling that something is going on.”
{Gottfrid, interview on Power of Metal; 2014}







“[…]There was something about the earthiness of the guitar and the voice. We wanted to have a Leadbelly sound to it. There was something very beautiful and haunting about keeping it so simple. It’s one of my favorites on the record. The song feels very much like us. It has something hypnotic about it. The repetition is strong.”
{Pelle speaking of “He Comes”, on Invisible Oranges; 2013}



"The oldest song which made it on the album was 'He Comes'. It was the summer 2011, basically right after the release of 'The World. The Flesh. The Devil.' Right after that, we started working on 'Death Knows Where' and 'Horses In The Ground'. It is worth emphasizing that this was completely new material, we did not use any remaining material from the previous album. At the same time, the fate of the number which opens the whole thing was no by no means certain. It was just one of the sketches that sat around for a while until we finally decided that it was what we wanted."
{Gottfrid, interview on Noise Magazine; 2023}



"Gottfrid had an instrumental demo of this track played on an acoustic guitar, which we all love from the first seconds. For a while we thought about recording an electric version, but in the end the original concept prevailed, enriched with a few additional guitars, vocals, tambourine and other percussion instruments."
{Pelle, interview on Noise Magazine; 2023}



"Two things: We were In Solitude, and He Comes."
Pelle, Eindhoven Metal Meeting, December 2014

“We had this guitar part in that song – on the ending of the song and in the middle of the song – which is a very sort of relentless, fast forward, almost black metal sort of riff. That is this thing that we go back to throughout the song, and end the song with. Pelle’s really a relentless sort of person, and that riff almost reminded us of him or something. I thought that he was really good at playing that sort of guitar, even better than us I guess (laughs). We thought that… and he meant a lot to us during the writing process. He’s a good friend of ours, so it felt very natural to bring him in to do something like that. He did a great job; I think he plays it like someone from a mental hospital, or something (laughs). You can really hear that; his personality really comes through in that guitar part.”
{Pelle Åhman about Pelle Forsberg’s
part on ‘Inmost Nigredo’, interview on Metal Forces; 2014}




“The point is that Pelle [Forsberg] plays the more black metal part on ‘Inmost Nigredo’, and we felt we needed to invite someone who really fits in with our way of seeing the music, it wouldn’t have been the same inviting Michael Denner of Mercyful Fate, Pelle was necessary to give that distinctive touch. He delivered it perfectly, and it reminded us of 'Casus Luciferi’, we are very happy with the result and I think he is, too.”
{Henke, interview on This Is Metal Mag; 2013}

“[…]It has something special to it that sort of stands out from the rest of the songs in a particular way for me…and the lyrical choice was just, like the general tone of the song was asking for something coming from that place in my heart, just what those lyrics are about. Whatever that song begs for, or the other way around, it’s the way to work. One thing just quite irrationally leads to another, but it still has a great point. That song invoked everything that is in the song, in a way. It’s a special one for all of us, we all love that song very dearly.”
{Pelle about “Inmost Nigredo”, interview on Capital Chaos TV; 2013}



“I’ve been thinking a lot about the time spent in Uppsala and about the personal and artistic impact that bands like Degial, Watain and Reveal have had on my life while I was writing ‘Inmost Nigredo’. Masochistic tendency, pride, will and pain, I think we all carry these feelings inside. Pelle’s part was simply perfect for his style. It could have been something from 'Casus Luciferi’. ”
{Gottfrid, interview on Dagheisha; 2013}

Putrefactio, from "De Sapientia Veterum".