COSMIC AUTUMN is a one-man Atmospheric Black Metal side project from Cologne/Bonne Germany. The author is unknown, and I was unable to gather any information on this new band out on the web. Their debut self-titled album here contains five tracks. "The Last Deception" leads off the album. It's bleak and funereal, with fierce Black Metal vocals, steady drumming, and a guitar riff that fills in all the blank spaces. A graceful riff appears out of nowhere, hitting magnanimous notes as it rolls forward. It ends with a beautiful passage of acoustical guitars mirroring the graceful riff that came before it.

"Event Horizon" roars in deeply, like a DIMMU BORGIR song, with symphonic elements in the background, while the main riff plays hard ball. The vocals are raging spurts of anger and hatred, while the riff moves into a darkened attacking mode. The intensity final subsides just a bit towards the end, and the riff takes a harrowing turn, ending the song in a blood sacrifice. "Indistinct Visions" opens with another wall of sound that toys playfully with you, while the vocals rage. Just before the half way mark, the sound drops off, and clean guitars provide a somber but joyous melody. It picks back up rather quickly, adding layers on top, ending in chaotic but structured method, with thunderstorms brewing in the background.

It segues into "Realms of Eternal Light," which opens with a mysterious sound, tentative at first, before launching head-first into a darkened riff with some running guitar parts. It settles into a main riff at around the three-minute mark, with Blackened vocals. Some harmonized clean vocals make an appearance, setting up against the vocals fry, as some clean instrumentation takes over at about the half-way mark, and it turns melancholy and charming, but returns the dark side for completion. "Solitude" is a closing ten-minute instrumental piece. Here is where the band really shines. The song is a wonderful mix of a lot of the elements we have heard before, some strong and refined sounds, some tender moments, despondent and grieving moments, and some that fall somewhere in between, all the while making your heart ache for more.

This is an excellent album in the genre that showcases well the expansiveness of Atmospheric Black Metal. The compositions are well penned, containing a mix of the traditional Black Metal elements with a nose for exploration, into the more elegant and graceful side of music, straddling the line between the two with finesse and refinement.