Urfaust are back with Teufelsgeist, a sixth full-length.
VRDRBR (drums, Botulistum, ex-Fluisterwoud, ex-Herder…) and IX (guitar/vocals, The Spirit Cabinet, ex-Gauhaert, ex-Grimm) chose this time to musically represent alcohol intoxication.
The album begins on Offerschaal der astrologische mengvormen, a catchy and above all very ambient song, as only Urfaust knows how to make some. The track is long, slow and heady, disturbing but hypnotic. Clean vocals enter the mixing, offering a mystical dimension to the sound, that darkens on the end. Bloedsacrament voor de geestenzieners confirms the oppression felt, and makes us sink little by little into darkness. Vocals are more worrying, more powerful, and heavy sonorities come to life. Van alcoholische verbittering naar religieuze cult is next, and even if it is very airy and mystical, the song is also very dark. No vocals, only keyboards that oppress us more and more. De filosofie van een gedesillusioneerde reconnects with Black Metal, but also a weighing and regular bass. The atmosphere is suffocating, and some backing vocals are trying to make us enter madness with them. Het godverlaten leprosarium, the last song, pushes back the boundaries of oppression, while dying its keyboards with heaviness and blackness to make us totally let go before fading away.
As always, Urfaust offers rich and qualitative compositions. The devilish Teufelsgeist is a very oppressive and ambient album, that let our mind getting darker from song to song with this so special concept.
90/100