AUßERWELT • Breath [2xLP]

Breath by AUßERWELT on Transparent Orange double vinyl. This is a Moment of Collapse Records' release. 

BIO

In a time when post-metal often finds itself recycling familiar tropes, AUßERWELT’s debut full-length album "Breath" is a rare gust of originality — both expansive and intimate, cerebral yet visceral. The Münster-based quartet has distilled over a decade of sonic exploration and transformation into a 63-minute odyssey that is equal parts brutal and beautiful, abstract and deeply human.

Spread across nine tracks — including two ambient interludes — "Breath" is a masterclass in emotional dynamics and genre fusion. While its roots lie firmly in atmospheric extreme metal, the band pushes well beyond the expected boundaries. Blackened urgency, death metal weight, progressive intricacy, and post-hardcore immediacy all coalesce seamlessly. And yet, "Breath" doesn’t feel like an attempt to tick genre boxes — instead, it flows with organic inevitability, like an exhale after a long-held breath.

The production — fully DIY, recorded in the band’s own studio between 2022 and 2024 — is a triumph in itself. There’s raw authenticity here, but also a clarity and punch brought into sharp focus by the expert mixing and mastering of Dennis Koehne. It’s an album that breathes in both scope and detail — from the shimmering fragility of its piano and clean guitar passages to the searing walls of distortion that crash like emotional tides.

Thematically, "Breath" centers on the act of breathing — not in a rigid conceptual way, but as a motif that ties the album together. It explores breath as both physiological function and existential metaphor — a means of survival, regulation, and resilience. It’s a subtle but potent thread that weaves through the record’s emotional highs and lows, giving the listener room to reflect, resist, and recharge.

Standout tracks are hard to isolate in such a cohesive work, but it’s worth noting how fluidly AUßERWELT shift between tightly structured catharsis and sprawling, meditative landscapes. The ambient interludes are not just breathers between assaults — they’re essential moments of reflection, proving the band’s command of mood and pacing.

But beyond its musicality, "Breath" resonates with a deeper ethos. The band’s vision is explicitly inclusive and hopeful, even amid the album’s darker shades. It’s music as a bridge — between unease and healing, between dreams and confrontation, between individuality and shared struggle. That political and humanistic undercurrent makes Breath not just a powerful artistic statement, but a socially conscious one as well.

In a genre often preoccupied with bleakness for its own sake, AUßERWELT offers a vital alternative — one that acknowledges the darkness, but refuses to be consumed by it. "Breath" is not just an album to be heard, but to be felt — deep in the lungs, the heart, and the space in between.