����� An Argentinean import of the 2006 album from French neo-classical / darkwave outfit Dark Sanctuary, notable for their sensuous, ethereal music and unearthly atmospherics. The band is also notable for featuring a mix of former members of Deinonychus, Osculum Infame and denizens of the French black metal underground, though the only real connection that this stuff has to black metal is in the shadowy romanticism that lurks throughout these songs. They're a recent discovery for me, having just become turned on to them via this reissue of the band's fifth full-length, originally out on Peaceville / Wounded Love, but I was hooked from the start by their graceful, elegiac sound, which can sometimes feel like a more gothic take on stuff like Amber Asylum and Dead Can Dance. There's an apocalyptic vibe to this too, though, which gives it a more sinister aura than a lot of similar, Projekt-style stuff.

����� Exaudi Vocem Meam: Part 1 unfolds into a gloriously dark and brooding soundscape, with ominous bells ringing out across droning string sections, deep and vast synthesizer drift spreading out beneath the gorgeous choral voices that slowly unfurl across the opening of "Ouverture". That dramatic intro makes way for the rest of the album's mournful, emotional beauty, with striking female vocals rising operatically over the group's shadowy, pensive arrangements, blending electronic keyboards and piano with the sounds of violins and bagpipes, weaving tribal rhythms and powerful rock drumming within these chamber-style pieces, slow-burning moodiness building into dramatic crescendos, which at their most intense can achieve a bleak, doom-laden power. Elsewhere, they incorporate martial percussion and funereal strings, passages of liturgical chant, the reverberant sound of pipe organs and carillons; this stuff can get fairly overwrought at times, and when that deep, Teutonic male voice creeps in with the spoken word parts (as well as some guest vocals from the singer for German doom-folk outfit Empyrium), it all gets pretty gothy, but that works as part of the overall funereal feel of Dark Sanctuary's music, creating an interesting mix of ecclesiastic atmosphere and baroque darkness. You also get a gorgeous cover of "The Garden Of Jane Delawney" by early 70s English folk rockers Trees that Dark Sanctuary make their own, transforming that into something lusher and colder and darker. It's all lovely stuff that unfolds with elegance and power, enhanced by the French language lyrics and the rich sound of their orchestral instrumentation. As mentioned before, if you're into stuff like Dead Can Dance, Arcana, In The Nursery, Amber Asylum, Elend, and even some of the later Swans material, there's a lot to dig with all of Dark Sanctuary's stuff.