Band: Nocte Obducta
Title: Sequenzen Einer Wanderung
Label: Supreme Chaos Records
Distribution: Suburban
Release date: 05/12/2008
Review: CD

Sad news: Nocte Obducta officially split up. The band did announce this news in 2006 already, yet now the final curtain has fallen. However the band ends in beauty with the release of Sequenzen Einer Wanderung, which lasts for forty four minutes. Sequenzen Einer Wanderung, Nocte Obducta’s swansong, dwells within the same regions as the former albums. This mainly instrumental album combines intelligent progressive Dark Metal with elements from Doom and Black Metal. The latter, however (unfortunately?), is of lesser importance than before. Sequenzen … contains two tracks, called Teil 1 and Teil 2 (Part 1 and 2), which both are very varying. The different parts within each ‘Teil’ have their own subtitle. Some of these sub-parts bring mesmerizing and pretty original (!) Prog-Rock (Ein Abend Im Dezember / Zu Fernen Ufern, Nebel-II etc) with a tribal edge (and even a certain Ozric Tentacles-sparkle, like on Über Wind’ge Wiesen), others bring funky, groovy Prog Metal with a few very heavy and oppressing moments (Der Nussbaum, Es Bersten Brücken Hinter Mir), some intermezzos are cold sound-scapes or samples (like Bei Den Feuern or Oktober), and all is interspersed with electronic and industrial injections of agony and pain. Teil 2 is heavier than Teil 1, and the most interesting thing of all (at least to me) is: Funeral Doom and Suicidal Black! As from the subtitle Januar, Teil 2 seems to start a sinister offensive against humanity with coldness and morbidity. The second part of Teil 2 mainly consists of elements from Industrial, grim Black Metal and dark Funeral Doom and such a grand finale I do appreciate!

83/100

Ivan Tibos.