Hailing from Hungary, Aetherius Obscuritas is a prolific (4 albums since 2004) one man black metal project that does a little more than the usual Burzum worshipping woe is me, moping in self despair act.

Coming across as more like a full band (with the aid of a session drummer), main man Arkhorrl renders a pretty decent, not great album of slightly melodic, slightly frostbitten, slightly ethnic black metal. While far ‘nicer’ than many of the one man projects out there and more focused on traditional Scandinavian riffage than sickly ambience, there are still a few moments of groaning angst and piecemeal atmospherics, making for a far more complete album than many of his one man peers.

The 12 tracks, including a fitting cover of Ragnarok’s “Menedékem a Sötétségben”, cover the expected range of sort of semi blistering, tremolo picked harmonies (notably “Víziók”, “Kilenc Tele a Ködnek”, “Kövekbe Vésett Nyugalom”, “Holtszak”), slower marches (“Mysterious Path of Desires”, “Black Moorland”) that sound more like the rest of the depressive one man black metal acts around now, but far less convincing and despondent. There’s also a piecemeal acoustic interlude (“Who Never Really Left”) and a few acoustic flourishes within the songs (“Idegenül”, “Journey to Immortality”) covering all the black metal bases.

9 of the tracks are in the native tongue, so unless you are fluid in Hungarian, the lyrics wont mean much, meaning the music has to carry the weight for the majority of you, and while it does to some extent, it’s hardly earth shattering. Still, the mix of melody and frosty, foresty grimness is solid, making for an above average black metal album.

[Visit the band's website]

---

Comments