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WAER007
Full length CD, 12 Tracks
“Nosferamor” unveils the Vampyric shroud of darkness, mysticism, love and pain. Behold the encounter of a mortal man and an undead beauty, folding into a heartbreaking love story. Feel the shivers of a passion of such depth, that the burden of immortality is but a small sacrifice.
Tracklist
Part 1: End of the Ordo Libidis
1. Dominum Maleficarium
2. The Mind and I
3. The Serpent Flame » Listen to MP3
4. Parit Dolum
5. The Witches' Lament
6. Sanctus
Part 2: Vampyrism
7. Transsylvania 1768
8. Nosferamor
9. Dansul Vampirilor
10. Clarity
11. Cold Skin
12. Infernarium
Reviews of Nosferamor (click highlighted text for full review)
"Nosferamor is (again) a succeeded attempt to combine melancholic church music with female voices and film-like passages. Master brain Lacrimas can be satisfied again with a nice and atmospheric album! 8/10"
- Gothtronic - Beautevil
"Nosferamor does remain a beautiful album with a splendid atmosphere that will appeal to gothic and darkwave fans of the above bands and even to some metalheads. In fact, this music will suit to anybody who appreciates atmospheric, mystical music that awakens the imagination. An album to listen to as one transcendental trip or perhaps as a soundtrack of a good fantasy novel!"
- Vampire magazine - Thijs van der Haar
"...Lady Clarisse. Her voice, the lead instrument of the band, merges with
the textures of those the musicians craft as it moves in and out of lyrics
for the conveyance of emotions!
Sometimes haunting and sometimes beautiful."
- Chain D.L.K.
"The sounds sometimes will make you want to shed a tear, of hide away.
Overall, it’s a very nice cd to listen to with the lights out a few candles
burning and you will not just hear the music but feel it, too. And I reckon
if your not the hasty type, its would be a nice love-making cd, too!"
-
Frozen leaves
"Much better than Secrecy. In the same class as Arcana."
- Sanjo Nakazo -
Radio Tas3
Full Reviews:
Gothtronic -
by Beautevil:
The production on the sequel of “Secrecy” sounds much more mature. In the sphere of the darkest moments of Arcana or Dark Sanctuary Encryption creates also thematically a sequel on their predecessor. “Nosferamor” may have the inspiration of ‘Vampyrism’, but the first part is still inspired by ‘End Of The Ordo Libidis’. This time the band has listened to the prayers of Silverwar (during her review of “Encryption”) and written down the lyrics and the (short) story of both parts in the tasteful booklet. There are also some changes in the Belgian band, because Lady Satine (backing and second line voices) is named as a new band member and Roger Keppens is the voice on the great song ‘Parit Dolum’. Lady Clarisse (the female lead vocals) sounds much better as well as on their previous album. Her high voice sounds much more in balance (although it’s sometimes still on the edge of right and wrong, like on ‘The Mind And I’ and ‘The Serpent Flame’). This is however critic from the biggest critic of all, because “Nosferamor” is (again) a succeeded attempt to combine melancholic church music with female voices and film-like passages. Master brain Lacrimas can be satisfied again with a nice
and atmospheric album!
8/10
Vampire magazine - by Thijs van der Haar:
Encryption is a gothic/darkwave act from Belgium, consisting of composer and synthesizer player Lacrimas and female vocalists Lady Clarisse (lead vocals) and Lady Satine (backing vocals). In 2003 Waerloga Records - an interesting Swedish label focusing on dark fantasy music - released their debut album Secrecy (which unfortunately isn't part of my cd-collection yet) which is the first episode of a trilogy about witchcraft, necromancy, civil fear of occultism and the inquisition. Or in other words: the dark side of the Middle Ages. On this second opus, Nosferamor, the above concept continues.
The album tells the story of Count Corbin, who established the Ordo Libidis: a secret society occupied with necromancy. The inquisition kills all members of the Ordo Libidis, except for Corbin. He manages to escape and travels to Transsylvania, where a vampire order shelters him. There he falls in love with female vampire Zorana, who turns Corbin into a vampire and teaches him the art of seduction and death...
Quite a story! The album title Nosferamor is a contraction of 'Nosferatu' and 'amor', as vampirism and love are the central themes of this opus. The record can be regarded as the soundtrack of the above tale. Anyway, what does the album offer musically? First of all "Dominum Maleficarum": a dark, Celtic sounding intro with ominous percussion, which creates the right atmosphere. Then the melancholic, fragile yet warm female voice of Lady Clarisse blends in, supported by backing vocals of Lady Satine. The second"The mind and I" and the third "The serpent flame" are both beautiful, calm songs in the same style, consisting of double-voiced female vocals and symphonic synthesizer accompaniment. In "Parit Dolum" a male choir is audible in an again ominous atmosphere. "The witches' lament" is a melancholic song, but with a splendid, heavenly atmosphere. Great! Also the subsequent instrumental intermezzo "Sanctus" is fascinating, featuring - if I'm not mistaken - samples of Gregorian chants, which are mixed with synthesizers in a great way. "Transsylvania 1768" is a sinister intro that marks the second part of this opus: "Vampyrism". The eighth track"Nosferamor" and ninth track "Dansul Vampirilor" continue in the atmosphere of the first songs. "Clarity" is a melancholic song with a beautiful tender atmosphere. Another highlight! In "Cold Skin" Lacrimas provides some low male vocals and "Infernarium" is a dim outro and the end of the second episode of this trilogy.
The above description of Nosferamor is quite praising, but I have some critical notes concerning the vocals. The backing vocals of Lady Satine turn out great in for instance "The witches' lament", but they sound weaker at some other moments and unfortunately her voice is terribly out of tune in the song "Nosferamor". And lead vocalist Lady Clarisse has quite a beautiful voice, but doesn't sound stable all the time either. I don't intend to assault all members of this combo, but Lacrimas' male vocals in "Cold skin" don't convince me at all. Musically he definitely compensates this, though, as the album as a whole is a more than fine symphonic darkwave release.
However, his arrangements are relatively simple and both musically and vocally Encryption is just slightly inferior to the established darkwave acts as Dargaard or Die Verbannten Kinder Evas.
Musically this album reminds me of Come heavy sleep of Die Verbannten Kinder Evas and the impressive atmosphere and intermezzi remind me of Avrigus' fascinating opus The secret kingdom. Encryption created an accessible symphonic darkwave album, sounding less gloomy or depressive than the recent Elend or last Dark Sanctuary albums. Despite the above comments, Nosferamor does remain a beautiful album with a splendid atmosphere that will appeal to gothic and darkwave fans of the above bands and even to some metalheads. In fact, this music will suit to anybody who appreciates atmospheric, mystical music that awakens the imagination. An album to listen to as one transcendental trip or perhaps as a soundtrack of a good fantasy novel!
Chain D.L.K.:
Encryptions second album is called “Nosferamor” and it unveils the Vampire shroud of darkness, mysticism, love and pain. Behold the encounter of a mortal man and an undead beauty, folding into a heartbreaking love story.
Fans that enjoy Autumn Tears and Dark sanctuary would most certainly like Encryptions “Nosferamor”.
This CD is way better than their debut and that goes for everything on it.
The voices, the melodies, the atmosphere, the FX and the compositions.
I think Lacrimas should take in some more musicians to spice up the songs as they sometimes feel a little to much synthetic.
Encryption has outdone themselves here with Nosferamor and most of all Lady Clarisse. Her voice, the lead instrument of the band, merges with the textures of those the musicians craft as it moves in and out of lyrics for the conveyance of emotions!
Sometimes haunting and sometimes beautiful.
4/5
Frozen Leaves - by Jolijn Calle:
A dark gothic band, they were formed by the keyboard player LacrimaS, who also played in Sereneless. Since 2000 they have played dark music, based on historical facts and happenings during the 16th – 18th century. First it started out as instrumental music. Later on singers joined in, and now they are a full band, signed by Waerloga Records. This is their 2nd CD coming out, and the Qntal like band takes us back again into the dark moments of history.
Nosferamor is split up in 2 pieces. The first part is mostly inspired by the legend of Ordo Libidis. The second part of the cd is called Vampirism, when reading the lyrics in the booklet; it’s mostly about being a vampire, Anne Rice style. The CD starts with an instrumental piece. It’s all really music to suit down wit, light a few candles and feel your being fading away. The first piece gives sets the mood quite well. The second song sets in but it doesn’t really impress me, the third song does though. Even though the singing isn’t that good, sometimes Lady Clarisse is a bit off. But the feeling of darkness, and ritual sounds, make me want to be a part of some secret society. It’s really floating into your ears; this song contains some slow drums. All with all, you can probably meditate to it quite well. Encryption also has used some Latin lyrics as well. ‘Parit Dolum’ is done completely in Latin. Its not a very happy song, none of them are, but in the background you can here the chains rattle in the dungeon and the women scream for help. It can make u feel quite uneasy even.
The next song ‘A Witches Lament’ is so slow you can use it so fall asleep to, the lyrics are so gothic it makes me laugh. You need to be in the mood for this.
The first part closes with another instrumental song, Sanctus. Its starts with the singing like monks do in church, and the high pitched tones make it a scary song. You know the movie Jaws? They try to do the same, but in a more or less gothic-in-a-dungeon kind of setting. With that the first part ends. On to Vampyrism.
The instrumental intro ‘Transsylvania 1768’, has a few keys in the middle of the song that are off, very off, it surprised me. Its supposed to sound old and ancient, but even then they knew that false music really isn’t nice to hear. Besides that there isn’t really something special to this song.
The second song is surprisingly well done compared to that I just heard, the singing is good, the keys are done well, there is a bit more variety in the song, some drums, some higher notes, and all is guided by the slow low keys that set the undertone for every song.
‘Dansul Vampirilor’ starts quite slow but gets more of a tempo in it later on. The signing is also more varying. Its all still the same low voices of Lady Clarissa and the backing vocals of Lady Satine. But they vary more, sometimes it sounds sad, then it sounds relieved, and sometimes they sound comforting. It’s about making your child part of the vampires, almost sounds like fun to be one if you hear this. The song after that, ‘Clarity’ looks a lot like the previous one. It’s a bit darker. If possible. I must say that a lot on this cd reminds me of the ‘Gods of the Sun’ Album, from My Dying Bride. It's the same atmosphere. Only without the guitars and with female vocals. By this time the album starts to bore me a bit, I like a bit more groove in my music. The songs with some drum and tempo in it still aren’t danceable, but quite ok to listen. The really slow parts, with just some keys and some vocals with all stretched out lines are getting boring. Like they knew what I mean ‘Cold Skin’ created with its more ritual sounding tempo and male low vocals more soothing tones. Then the ladies come in again, but the sensual and erotic tone to the song it set. I like it; it’s a nice change to some other parts of the album. It stops really abruptly at 4 minutes. To bad, I quite like that one.
Then its time for the song that closes ‘Vampyrism’. Another instrumental part, ‘Infernarium’ Has some low male vocals in the background but mainly some weird starchy noises on the cd that, listening to it in a suitable environment, would give me the creeps. The sounds die out after a few minutes, and that happens to slowly you don’t even notice the music has stopped until after a few minutes.
To conclude, I listened to some of the songs a few times to get some feeling with the music. I quite liked it, Encryption has set a dark fantasy like gothic atmosphere. The sounds sometimes will make you want to shed a tear, of hide away. Overall, it’s a very nice cd to listen to with the lights out a few candles burning and you will not just hear the music but feel it, too. And I reckon if your not the hasty type, its would be a nice love-making cd, too!
Radio Tas3 - by Sanjo Nakazo:
Translated to english by the radio dj.
Much better than Secrecy. In the same class as Arcana. Sometimes brilliant and sometimes OK. Overall a gothic fantasy album with a great story.
With Nosferamor Encryption creat almost a masterpiece. Reaching back further and further until eventually hitting vampirism.
A surprising success, given the very different sounding nature of this album. (After this an interview with Encryption was aired) |
