The intro brings you drums, starting out solo. A few seconds in, the violin joins and creates this mystery that I was expecting. The music flows through your speakers, creating an ocean of sound waves. It comes to shore and up is next song Lebenslast. A low strumming guitar enters the game. Low power chords with a higher melody seek the company of drums that follow the same pattern. Once again, we hear the screams of lead singer Meta List, giving us what we are used to from the previous EP’s; Melodic death metal that grows on you.

Lysis comes in fast with all the instruments and vocals at once. A high melody dances on top of the low strumming guitars and low grunting vocals. The song is vibrant, it’s alive, and it models itself in different shapes, yet stays in the same style so you will recognize it. The riffs are solid and are played on a bed of a very fast bass drum. The changes in this song keep you hooked, and before you know it, it has already ended and continued into the next song Hine Nui Te Po. This song lets the instruments talk first. It has a calmer pace. The guitars ring out and give you some time to think, then the strong-willed vocals come in and the vibe changes from calm to mighty. After some research, Hine-Nui-Te-Po translates to the great woman of the night. In Maori legends, she receives the spirits of humans when they die. Near the end of the song, it feels like chaos. The song goes faster, and the music wants to show distress. Then, it becomes calm again and fades out.

Te Atua brings in the piano. You listen, and you keep waiting for the next thing as the melody repeats itself. Then, the subtle change is there and distracts your ear. The music takes you along to the next journey. This supernatural song (Atua) actually translates to God, which once again shows how good Aeon of Awareness is in expressing emotion through music.
Ira Dimensions is once again full power from the start. The drums are immensely fast and give an extra dimension to the song. This song also changes pace a couple of times. It keeps you hooked to the music. Even though melodic death metal is not my favorite genre, Aeon of Awareness does something special to it that keeps you hooked and longing for more. If you want to listen to good music, just put the CD on. But this one is also perfect if you want a deeper meaning. The music makes it clear, and the words are there to give some extra research material.

Tumatauenga starts with a simple but clear melody on the electric guitar. Slowly the drums join, and the song becomes more solid. Vocals are being added, and the vibe gets more spiritual. It lets it ring for a second and the band comes on in full. The melody is still there, but a little faster and less dreamy. Before us is the god of war and human activities such as hunting, fishing and cooking according to the Maori mythology. The story behind this god explains why the song first starts calm and clear, and later faces reality. After the chaos is over, the calm returns and the song ends, simple but clear once again.
Fort Forest keeps a steady pace with the electric guitars for the first minute. It also has a very nice “blegh” in it. It starts to grow on you, you close your eyes, but then that minute is over and the song goes into action. It’s faster, you open your eyes, but still are emerged in this energetic but solid song.

Last song King Kauri starts with strong electric guitar strums, higher sounding than mostly on this album. The pace goes a bit faster further along in the song. Turns out, Kauri refers to very big trees that are ecologically and spiritually significant to Maori. It is the largest by volume, but not the tallest. The notes are a little higher throughout the whole song, it goes fast, tells its story and ends with a short “blegh”. We get some winding down time to think about all we have heard, with the clean guitar closing the album.

Guitarist/bassplayer Per Lümbersson explains:

And with that, the album is already over. Like I expected, Aeon of Awareness created a deep album. There are two sides to this: 1) the music itself. The album contains melodic death metal and changes pace fluently and frequently, which keeps you hooked to hear what’s next. 2) The story in between the lines. I only wrote down a little of the stories behind the songs, but there is so much more to find out about the meaning behind the songs. Those two sides combined into one create this album called Rarohenga, which is the subterranean realm where spirits of the deceased dwell after death, according to Māori tradition. Aeon of Awareness is able to express feelings through music so well, that the sounds really capture the stories behind it. A true pearl for the ear. On top of that, this album seems to be connected with the previous EP called Wairua.

Aeon of Awareness is:
Per Lümbersson: guitar/bass/backing vocals
Meta List: vocals
Stefan Roth: drums

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