Urfaust / Circle of Ouroboros - Auerauege Raa Verduistering [Full Split]

Artist: Urfaust Album: Auerauege Raa Verduistering Year: 2006 Country: Netherlands Genre: Atmospheric Black Metal, Experimental Black Metal Lyrical Themes: Death, Occultism, Intoxication, Rituals Status: Active Current Label: Ván Records Bandcamp: Artist: Circle of Ouroborus Album: Auerauege Raa Verduistering Year: 2006 Country: Finland Genre: Experimental Black Metal, Acoustic Lyrical Themes: Melancholy, Nature, Occultism Status: Active Current Label: Kuunpalvelus Bandcamp: N/A - SONGLISTING - [Side A] Urfaust 01 - 00:00 - Verächtung Wird Einen Messertragenden Schatten 02 - 02:41 - Der Halbtoten Dichters Schein-Existenz 03 - 07:56 - Zur Winter-Wanderschaft Verflucht 04 - 14:43 - Dämmert, Gelähmt Und Mit Scheinbar Erloschenem Geist [Side B] Circle of Ouroborus 05 - 25:17 - Dream of Death 06 - 29:52 - Mouldering Leaves 07 - 33:48 - Dimicatio 08 - 36:59 - Eyes of the Flames 09 - 40:01 - Congregation of Sorrow 10 - 44:09 - In the Forest of the Horned God This is an interesting and somewhat surprising combination for a split to me. Urfaust is a duo that was started in 2003 as an ambient project but gave that up to adopt a more atmospheric sound. Many of their releases contain lengthy instrumental orchestral pieces that tend to have seemingly random structuring and many sustained silent pauses. On the whole, I’ve become a big fan of their sound, namely the agonized shouting of the “almost“ clean vocals and this split showcases their uniqueness. Circle of Ouroborus is another duo that was started in 2004 and has a long discography of mostly demos, EPs and splits but still a surprising number of LPs (my favorite of these being the 2011 album Eleven Fingers). They’re notable for their frequent use of acoustics and their strange clean vocals the latter of which has been described as sounding as if it’s underwater. While unfortunately, this particular split is not a great showcase of that particular characteristic, it does feature plenty of avant-garde song structuring and other bizarre qualities.