The Mosaic Window have signed to Vesperian, and the album follows five weeks later: Answered Prayers is dated 13 November, with What Sage Could Not Cleanse out now.
Five weeks between a signing and a record means the record was finished first, which is the usual arrangement at this level and is also the reason a label can take a project like this at all. Vesperian is an imprint of Metal Blade, and a one man operation is cheaper to sign than a band and easier to schedule.
What the money is buying is a retreat. Andrew Steven Brown, who plays everything, has pulled back from the polished prog tinged death and black hybrid of Hemasanctum in 2024 and gone to first and second wave black metal, raw and with the production stripped off. The first single is itself an older composition, which is the clearest signal of intent available: the new direction is a return.
Ten tracks, and the concept is worth repeating as the label states it. Humanity is erased retroactively, centuries before the Industrial Revolution, as the only cure for a poisoned world. Black metal has written that sentiment a thousand times without putting a date on it.