CD

Noircure is the musical endeavor of multi-instrumentalist Raffaele Galasso from Apulia, Southern Italy. Albeit born in 2021, Noircure comes after years of experience and hard work in a number of different underground projects, managing to be both something completely new and perfectly self-aware as well.

Galasso describes his latest one-man band as follows: “Noircure was born in 2021 as the result of blending two of my great passions: atmospheric black metal and certain shoegaze and new wave sounds. I recorded, mixed and mastered Kyrie inspired by these musical atmospheres, favoring improvisation in the recording phase, preferring "natural" sounds over production editing and trying to limitate effects as much as possible. I wanted Kyrie to personify a living entity capable of communicating a wide range of emotions in the most direct way possible. In order to do this, I tried to recreate all the sounds that I had figured out in my head only with my guitar and without the use of synths”.

The result is an honest, breathtaking album, plunging into the depths of blackgaze, where guitars are paramount, accompanied by a wide range of vocal styles, adding some Mediterranean vibes which make Klimt 1918 come to mind. If the likes of Alcest, Lantlôs and Sadness are part of your everyday music digest, Noircure will surely leave its mark.

Digipak CD with 12 pages booklet

Ysyry Mollvün is a conceptual project created by Zupai Ulen in 2012. In November 2015, Antonio Sanna (Downfall Of Nur) met Zupai and offered to be the producer. As time passed by, Sanna got involved in the crating of this project, composing arrangements for acoustic guitars and native instruments such as the charango, sikus, flutes and percussions. The band’s name comes from the words “river” in the Guaraní language, indigenous people from South America (Ysyry) and “blood” in the language of Selk'nam people, the indigenous tribe from southern Argentina (Mollvün).

Ysyry Mollvün tells the story of K'aux, a being that was once a human who was educated by the Selk’nam gods to teach the tribe what was necessary to outlive in the harsh conditions of the extreme south of the world. K'aux betrayed his oath and did not pass on what he learned, and for this reason he was condemned to lie forever, neither dead nor alive, in the center of the earth.

A thousand years later Espíritu del Monte, the god who punished K'aux couldn't understand what happened to the other deities since, except for the god of death (San la Muerte), they were no longer on this earth. All had changed, the people who lived on this earth were more, the flora and fauna that had inhabited no longer existed and everything that was for thousands of years was longer as it had been. Because of this, el Espíritu del Monte decides to wake up K'aux so that he can see with his human's eyes what happened and what must be done so that everything goes back to what once was.

It is never easy to follow up with another album, especially considering the impact made by the complex wild flight of musical fantasy of "La Masquerade Infernale". ARCTURUS elegantly solved this conundrum by releasing the comparatively more straightforward third full-length, "The Sham Mirrors" in 2002. This does not mean that the Norwegians had lost their appetite for experiments. The vocals by Garm (ULVER) are more soaring and wide-ranging than ever on this release, while main man Steinar "Sverd" Johnsen keeps adding classic prog rock excursions to his repertoire. Yet, the guitars are more often set to a more conventional metal mode on "The Sham Mirrors". Still complex, still avant-garde, ARCTURUS clearly consolidated their compositions on "The Sham Mirrors" and while still using many sonic elements, those rather serve each individual song than try to stick out.

First Album from this Atmospheric Appalachian Black Metal Band.

Digipack with 8 pages Booklet limited to 500 Copies

REISSUE ON THEIR NEW LABEL OSMOSE

CD in Digipak with 20-page booklet.

An early progenitor of funeral doom, Norway's FUNERAL have returned with ’Praesentialis in Aeternum’, their first new album in nearly a decade! The quartet bring forth a soul-rending offering that is rife with agony and pain, providing a fitting soundtrack for the times. Crushing, mournful passages and soaring lead breaks amplify its sorrowful atmosphere, and are certain to rive the heart, mind, and soul of listeners.

For fans of: EVOKEN, AHAB, MOURNING BELOVETH

Olio Tähtien Takana is one of the artistic expressions of Finnish multi-instrumentalist v-KhaoZ (Vargrav, Druadan Forest and many others), here joined in his artistic endeavour by singer Hellwind Inferion (Desolate Shrine, Sargeist).

Spectral Katharsis is the third album by Olio Tähtien Takana, and is described by Hellwind with a series of key terms: “Cosmic, majestic misanthropy and ultimate devil worship”. Expect fury, rage and patterns of keyboards to surround you and bring you on your journey through the cosmos.

On the musical side of things, v-KhaoZ says: “We wanted something different than our other bands, a more straightforward, yet melodic approach. To this we added a varied singing style and otherworldly, space-like keyboards, to reach the multidimensionality we were aiming for”. Spectral Katharsis will tickle fans of Limbonic Art, Odium and the mid-’90s symphonic black metal scene.

The band's very name is probably the best expression to describe what v.KhaoZ and Hellwind Inferion are trying to accomplish with their collaboration, as Olio Tähtien Takana is Finnish for 'A Creature Beyond the Stars'.