Style: Melodic black metal
Primary Emotions/Themes: Ancient landscapes, times long forgotten, sorcery and war
Thoughts: I don't know if I know a story more tragic than that of Aeternus. This band had one of the most unique styles in all of metal. Instantly recognizable, incredibly epic, deep and compelling riffs and melodies. They had it all... for two albums.
The first of those albums was their debut full length: Beyond the Wandering Moon. This album - while less refined than the follow up - offers everything that I've ever wanted out of a new band. A style that is strongly their own, a profound sense that they know what they want to do, and most of all the means to execute their vision to near perfection.
That's not to say that Beyond the Wandering Moon is perfect, in fact it's far from it. What it does have though is a near infallible sense of identity. Aeternus knew exactly what they wanted to do with this album and it shows. Maybe it's the long, drawn out riffs that take minutes to fully develop. Maybe it's Ares' deep vocals that come in stark contrast to almost all the other black metal at the time. Maybe it's the brief yet tasteful use of keyboards and acoustic instrumentation that gives this album it's edge. Maybe it's all of these things put together.
What Aeternus does best is give these songs an incredible sense of scope. What I mean is that Aeternus can take a riff, a concept, a melody and expand upon it and explore variations of it for minutes at a time without it becoming boring. They will change a note or two in an open chord, switch from a blast beat to a double bass driven gallop. Minor changes, but enough to break up the song to give it an entirely new character.
Sentinels of Darkness does this the best on the album. It's a slow song by black metal standards and it revolves around a melodic open chord progression. The song starts out with the main riff and immediately it feels like I'm staring across a deep valley with fog laden over the winding river that formed it over eons. The song continues to slowly progress around this main riff for nearly eight minutes. On paper this sounds like it should be incredibly boring, and I need to reiterate that it is the exact opposite. This song is unlike anything I've ever heard from any other band (including Aeternus), and it maintains its incredible character throughout the run time. Ten out of ten song.
The remainder of the album alters between quicker black metal styled riffs and the more slower to develop riffs similar to Sentinels of Darkness. Whatever the band chooses to do with their riffs, drums, guitars and vocals it works. There isn't a single moment on the album that's worth skipping. It's a damn shame they decided to move off this style later on, they had something magical going on here.
Written February 5th 2024
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