Merciful Nuns – Oneironauts XII (Album – Solar Lodge)
Genre/Influences: Industrial, Metal, Crossover.
Format: Digital, 2CD.
Background/Info: New album by the established German formation Merciful Nuns. The album features the main disc plus an extra disc, a kind of EP featuring four extra songs.
Content: The main disc takes off with the title songs featuring 4 parts. We next get 4 more songs which all together create a heavy, powerful Industrial/Metal/Rock composition driven by front man and core member Artaud Seth’s deep timbre of voice. The second disc reveals a more bombastic production creating a kind of dramatic expression. I also noticed organ sounds injecting a psychedelic touch.
+ + + : Merciful Nuns has clearly evolved throughout the years moving towards a more personal sound approach. The new work doesn’t sound that different and brings different influences together. The songs have been meticulously crafted while carried by heavy, Metal-like guitar playing. “Requiem For The Departed” is my personal favorite cut for its menacing atmosphere recovered with melodic synth parts. I once again want to salute the great, artistic, artwork of the album.
– – – : “Oneironauts XII” doesn’t sound as a bite-sized bite but needs a few listening before you really get into it.
Conclusion: Artistic and original but not what I would label as their best album to date.
Best songs: “Requiem For The Departed”, “Oneironauts” + “Oneironauts – The Lesser Light”.
Rate: 7½.
Artist: www.mercifulnuns.com / www.facebook.com/MercifulNuns
Label: www.solarlodge.de / www.facebook.com/SolarLodgeRecords
About Merciful Nuns
Merciful Nuns is a German dark rock project based in Berlin, led by Artaud Seth, who also fronts The Garden of Delight and Near Earth Orbit and runs the Solar Lodge label. The band numbers its albums with Roman numerals, from “Liber I” through “Anomaly X” and “Kvltan”, released in 2022 four years after “Anomaly”. “Oneironauts XII” followed as a 2CD set on Solar Lodge, and an exclusive version of “Oneironauts” also appears on the “Resurgence” 7CD Solar Lodge label compilation.
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