This is the second album from the German duo ÆTERNUM SACRO – and quite a stunner and progression from the first album. A natural progression so to say. The first album “O Cruor Sanguinis” from 2021 is instrumental all the way through, offering great enchanting and drawing ambient sound spheres of melancholia and mysticism. Though on the new album both members of the band have found their vocals and deliver all from grim frostbitten screams to melancholic and anguished singing. We are in a universe of cold old schooled Black Metal mixed up with droning ambient spheres made by guitars, bass and drums. That mixed with darkness and despair cloaked in deep melancholia, a longing after something long gone and almost forgotten. It took a few listens before this album locked onto me. Though, a dark room, a few candles, a solid glass of red wine and the album in headphones, and you are in for an emotional ride. The songwriting is stellar, the duo uses quite simple techniques to draw you in, but it works quite well. The blend of old Scandinavian school of raw and pummeling Black Metal together with the colder and eerie disharmonic guitar chords and the doomier parts work well. Top that with Progressive Rock trades here and there, a treat that lifts the album quite high. The track ‘Scorned Entity’ clocking in at 16:09 minutes has it all and is a magnum opus on this album. “Cielos Prometidos, Cielos Clandestinos” took me by quite a surprise, first of all, the great and varied vocal work is a fist in the face, when you expected an instrumental treat. The sheer aggressiveness, the broader atmospheres that the band builds up, everything is taken to a whole other level, and it all works so well. This is surely one of the year’s greatest surprises, even though it is quite early to call it! Enter the wrecked gate to the garden of eden: www.facebook.com/aeternumsacro, www.facebook.com/kombinatschwarzmetall