LUNAR AURORA — Zyklus (review)

LUNAR AURORA — Zyklus album cover Album · 2004 · Atmospheric Black Metal Buy this album from MMA partners
4.5/5 ·
Vehemency
For me, Lunar Aurora seems to be a band of one album. And its name is Zyklus. Although the band has released quite a bunch of material since the mid 90s until the current indefinite hiatus, I cannot stress enough how epic this album is when compared to the rest of their catalogue. Certainly none of Lunar Aurora’s releases are bad, but they pale in comparison with this beast from 2004.

Zyklus consists of four long tracks of atmospheric black metal. Unlike many other Lunar Aurora albums, the production is very raw, creating an ice cold atmosphere. Not many albums manage to sound as fierce and utterly cold, to be honest. The album is carefully constructed, and although many people have complained about repetition, I don’t think it’s tedious at all. Certainly there is some repetition but all the little details in the many layers of Zyklus keep it interesting. And honestly, repetition really works for this kind of albums that focus on atmosphere. Personally I can’t even find that much ”repetition” here: the album is very, very diverse with all the acoustic guitars, synths, samples, tempo changes et cetera. I guess this album just takes a few more listens than an usual black metal album to show all its hidden beauty.

It is not easy to explain why albums like Zyklus are great because they rely so much on atmosphere. Things like that can’t easily be put into words. It’s too bad I can’t speak German, and this is one of the only downsides I can find. Zyklus seems to carry a strong theme about cycles (the four songs are named after the four times of day) so it’s a shame I can’t understand what is being sung. Fans of Lunar Aura will surely respect this album, but as far as I’m aware, it’s not a common favourite among them. Maybe I’m missing something in Lunar Aurora’s other albums? I really need to dig into them again, though I’m skeptical that I would find something as beautiful as Zyklus.
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