A storm-like sound opens the EP. Wind blows past your ears. A piano follows note by note. It adds more notes as it goes. The music gets deeper and deeper. Then the guitar blasts through your speaker. It catches you off guard since the wind and the piano seek your attention and hold on to it. What an amazing instrumental intro again for the first song ‘A World Beyond’.

The second track opens with a low tuned guitar. The drum is silent in the back. Vocals whisper the song title: ‘Te Kore’. The verses sound calm and mysterious. The choruses are powerful and heavy. Te Kore translates into the great nothingness, or the empty void. It was a state of mind you had to be in to follow the philosophy of the Maori.

The sounds you hear at night. Silence, yet not completely silent. Crickets, a soft breeze, … A violin creates a peaceful, calm feeling. It gets a bit unnerving when the music gets louder and louder. Something is coming. But then again, it also ends very calm again. Like the way it started. ‘Te Ao’, if I understand it correctly, it’s about balance. The balance of light and dark, the balance of living and non living things. The balance of everything. This is symbolized by the calm parts at the beginning and at the end of this song, and the louder part in the middle. It’s balanced. Even though words can probably not exactly explain what ‘Te Ao’ means, this song definitely can.

‘Rise of Tãne’ fully shows the death metal power within this band. After the calmer songs, this one jumps right at you from your speakers. Tãne is, according to the Maori, the god of the forest and the birds. But, Aeon of Awareness says, ‘we are your biggest mistake!’. Humanity is pretty much destroying the earth. You can’t deny that. ‘Tãne, Rise!’.

‘’The beauty of nature could not satisfy.’’

Wind is blowing again, but stronger this time. A storm is coming. One long guitar strum enters the storm. Slow, but very clear. The wind vanishes, now it’s just the guitar, bass and drums join a bit later. Melodic but firm guitar riffs lead this song. Near the end, more death metal gets mixed into it.  This is ‘Revenge of Tawhiri’, revenge form the God of weather. Imagine thunderstorms, hurricanes, black and red clouds. Like humans, Tawhiri also can destroy nature. He can rip trees out of the ground and leave them there. The trees that Tãne, the God from the previous song, worked so hard to take care of.

Then we get to the title of this EP: Wairua. Wairua is the spirit of a person. Like when you die, it’s the spirit, or wairua, that leaves the body. To me, it feels like we are a spirit, and we get to go on a journey through this EP. To do so, we first need a clear mind. When we get to that state, we can see with a clear view what is happening on this earth. There is a lot of darkness, but not all that is seen as dark, needs to be dark.

All of that is brought to you through melodic death metal. But not all is in that exact style that that word implies. It’s more than that. Aeon of Awareness dare to go another route within the death metal style. They use violins, pianos, calmer guitar playing, … Listen to this if you are open to something new. Not only in music, but also in the message. Maybe it’s the philosopher part in me that goes off again, but there’s definitely more to this EP than words can describe.

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

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