Lucifer Rising is an infamous compilation, released by the French Athanor label. This release comes with a full color A5 booklet, which just looks stunning. The artwork is beautiful and suits the concept really well. The fact that this compilation is quite wanted is probably because there is a studio-version of Blood Axis’ “Electricity” on it, which I believe is exclusively recorded for this compilation. Well, if you own the great live-album “Blot- Sacrifice in Sweden” you know how magnificent this track is. No further comments needed.
Opening track of Lucifer Rising is “Parzifal” by Endura; a very good neo-classical track with lots of atmosphere. This one is followed by a project named Chöd, which I didn’t know until now. Still, I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of their “Nothing is”. It’s the most industrial track on this compilation, but nonetheless full of atmosphere and fitting the concept. After Blood Axis follows Der Blutharsch. Well, although D.B. is not always known for saving the best work for compilations, I really like this track. It starts rather tranquil, but after a while we get slow pounding drums and, of course, sampled German speeches. “Morning star” by Dawn & Dusk Entwined is a very nice track as well, with heavy and militant, keyboards and (keyboard-) trumpets, which reminded me a bit of Gae Bolg. Very good melodies, although the monotous vocals start to annoy me a bit towards the end of the track.
Then we have Allerseelen, with a track called “Flamme”. This one consists of a repetitive melody on bass guitar, backed up by background noises. The female vocals are great, citing a poem by Nietzsche. In my opinion the track is a bit too long, and probably not everyone’s cup of tea. But hey, we are talking about Allerseelen here, right? Original and strange as always…
“Prometheus” by Ernte is a sort of spoken word piece of the poem by Goethe, and is followed up by Bobby BeauSoleil. This guy is well-known as friend of Charles Manson and has been in prison for murder since a long time. “Lucifer Rising (2nd movement)” is a somewhat strange track, consisting of spacy keyboards and electric guitarsolo’s. A weird but quite enjoyable song. Next is Changes, which in my opinion is the one band that doesn’t fit the concept of this release. The atmosphere is very medieval, and I believe the lyrics of their contribution have nothing to do whatsoever with the whole Lucifer Rising concept. The music is nice though; folky acoustic guitars and somewhat heroic vocals.
Well, two songs left… Waldteufel contributes with a track which made me laugh my head off, to be honest. I seldom heard such a ridiculous song; if you have the chance, check it out! Okay, I guess Markus Wolff in a way succeeded in making a song with a very authentic and archaic feel to it, but I just can’t take the vocal lines, whistling, and silly keyboard sound serious. I prefer songs like “Wolfsstund”, which prove that Waldteufel indeed is a very talented band. Last track on the compilation is by the Italians of Ain Soph. The sounds of this track are quite suitable to listen to when you are alone in the dark… very creepy indeed!
Well, overall the music on this release is very good, I really enjoyed listening to most of the tracks. Furthermore the concept around the fallen angel, the luciferian archetype and the “free spirits” is very interesting, and last but not least supported by marvelous artwork. Don’t hestitate to buy it when possible…
