Moorgeist (DEU) / Knoeterych (DEU) – Split DIGI-CD

Black Metal

Parting ways with HETROERTZEN in late 2021, bassist Ham continued down a path of his own, and as the sole composer “Tristan Moreau”, he founded DER TRAUERSCHWAN the same year in the Swedish town Västerås.

The debut album “Sanguinare Vampiris” is the completion of poetry & song that was written during the past two pandemic years.

Inspired by the English poets of the romantic era, lyrical themes explore the naked diary of a vampire, and while musically a bleak conjunction between 90’s black- and doom metal, the harmonic teachings of classical musical theory also have a certain impact.
With influences reaching from Summoning to My Dying Bride, DER TRAUERSCHWAN provides a unique blend of somber doom- and black metal, with vampiric-themed lyrics expressed through haunting songwriting.

Black Metal

Titled Outojen Tornien Varjoissa, FAUSTIAN PACT’s full-length debut is the grand culmination of all the gloriously bewitching work they brewed across that trio of demos. Exploding with an effervescence that’s addicting and undeniable, their swords-aloft attack surges and swells, crests and cascades. At the forefront are stained-glass synths whisked from a time – and a fantastical landscape – far, FAR away, sumptuously underlining their heroic/romantic style of black metal deeply steeped in a nostalgic past. Across the album’s 41 minute (fantastical) landscape are spread lyrics of splendorous mythology, swords & sorcery, vast forgotten realms brought to life through wily, wanderlusting black metal betraying a noble melodicism. FAUSTIAN PACT are thus a unique balance of contrasts: orkish energy vs. mystical atmosphere, dungeon rawness vs. castle-top aristocracy, obsidian darkness vs. gleaming light. So, whether 25 years ago or 2500, removed by a reality or two, Outojen Tornien Varjoissa is timeless BLACK METAL MAGICK – dark medieval times have at last arrived!

Black Metal

While largely within the wider umbrella of black metal, RVBBERVVITCH’s unique expression nevertheless evades easy categorization – nor easy consumption. Guitars are harsh and cold, yet seemingly summoned from a post-apocalyptic crater rather than an amp; bass tones are mercilessly overdriven, grinding body and soul into the dirt; cutting out humanity altogether, both blastbeats and doomy stomps pump like pus from a Midi drum-machine; and sinister echoing soundscapes meld with malodorous French vocals, which demonically range heavily distorted screeches to low-pitched grunts. And whereas so many nowadays “black metal” bands play-act, the creator of RVBBERVVITCH matches content with form, life with art: the unconventional, largely taboo visual imagery is a reflection of the artist’s unabashedly hedonistic lifestyle.