Lunar Aurora - Andacht (2007)

Looking too Northern nightscapes, I bequest myself too Lunar Aurora!  "Andacht," is the eighth album from brothers Aran und Sindar, along with fellow Bavarian countrymen Skoarth, on guitars, and Whyrhd as guest vocals.  Lunar Aurora has been a long standing German black metal band currently on the Cold-Dimensions label, which appears to have remained cloaked in obscurity for at least a decade.

Andacht emerges with a hefty eleven minute long track entitled, "Glück."  This track opens with a signature Lunar Aurora ambiance that isolates and severs its listener from the world around them.  The scene suddenly sweeps into a rush of blackened fury comparable to the sound of Nokturnal Mortum, and just as the mood is set, layers of ambient samples are added too the mix.  This is where Lunar Aurora seems to enjoy a more avant-garde role.  Imagine two tracks not quite sync'd up together, almost as if one would need an auditory stereoscope to synthesize the two.  The prevailing guitars win out in the end here, in this extensive ode to, "Happiness,"  also a change up in vocals turning the menacing song into one of severe distress drenched in men chanting from other dimensions.

Andacht is introduces each song with their own unique environments, often the ones I personally can associate with desolation.  "Findling," illustrates this semblance as the fourth track of, "Andacht," where the we get to spend the night at water's edge as a storm approaches.  The entire mood of this song is man, staring into the nights abyss, confronting all the despairs that ail him.  Screams from beyond the vale resonate as the percussion and guitars compliment them, leaving nothing to be purged.  Other tracks on this album expose the harsher side of Lunar Aurora, allowing war driven instrumentals, as well as implementing the various vocal styles from the three contributing vocalists.  "Das Ende," ends this epic of sorrow and night skies by sending us into a void of wailing entities that haunt throughout the song slipping in and out from the sweeping synth pads.  

The message of, "Das Ende," is certainly clear as an epilogue to one of my new favorite albums and one of many worth checking out.  Lunar Aurora is definitely the stuff dreams are made of for the reclusive.  Highly recommended for those moments when one can find solitude in confronting the existential realities of life.