MAERUND - Manna Pharmakeia (from "Sunthema")

From the conceptual split album "SUNTHEMA" by DEATHSPIRAL OF INHERITED SUFFERING, ELYSIAN BLAZE, PANEGYRIST and MAERUND (I, Voidhanger Records and Rubeus Obex - 2026) 2LP/2CD/Digital release date: June 26th, 2026 EU Customers - Buy from I, Voidhanger Records Eshop: metalodyssey.8merch.com Bandcamp: i-voidhangerrecords.bandcamp.com US Customers - Buy from Rubeus Obex Bandcamp: rubeusobex.bandcamp.com Eshop: rubeusobex.bigcartel.com _______________________ A WORK OF FOUR WILLS. Wherein each offering functions as prayer, invocation, and devotional act, expressed through webs of symbol and word uniquely drawn from the life-path of each devotee. This is “Sunthema”, the culmination of long-suffering labors, now presented by I, Voidhanger Records and Rubeus Obex. Battering down the gates, DEATHSPIRAL OF INHERITED SUFFERING opens with their first new material since “Metamorphosphoros”, the 2018 split with PRECARIA and DOMINUS IRA. Equal parts death and black metal, the Cult of DIS have streamlined their aggression into a more compact riff-centered approach. Each track is a declarative statement. Masterful ambient sound-crafting further infuses the work with a haunted afterglow. A continuation of the central quest of DIS, this new chapter tells of fury, grief, and sacrifice, but also of rebirth and new vistas of spiritual sight. Continuing the ascendant trajectory of 2018’s long-form single “The Virtue of Suffering”, ELYSIAN BLAZE now assumes astral raiment. Mutatiis’ signature black-doom melancholia is given kosmische inflection in “Ascenturion”, a seventeen-minute composition imbued with a pathos both ancient and futuristic. Twisting and turning through uncharted new worlds with seemingly effortless grace, this is ELYSIAN BLAZE at its most adventurous and cinematic. Standing as a monument in its own right, this work also hints at the future, as the long-awaited full-length follow-up to 2012’s “Blood Geometry” reaches its final stages of completion. Drink the blood of vision. Eight years since their debut, PANEGYRIST unveils their maximalist devotional ethos in matured and intensified form. While raising higher the bright peaks of the symphonic and avant-garde, a redoubled aggression anchors dizzying polyphony in riff-driven ferocity. Technicality and complexity are indeed heightened, but the true meaning of each element is only found in the whole of the sacred architecture. Luciferous Christworship. A work perfected in darkness. Amen. The closing of “Sunthema” is simultaneously the anointing of a new entity. Emerging from eremitic seclusion to place the capstone, MAERUND is the eponymous voice of Rubeus Obex’s shadowy other half. Black Metal distilled into rabid ferocity, elemental and boiling with infernal prayer. An all-consuming desire to be devoured by Divine flame, manifesting the worship of Christ in hell. A soul-selling pledge, an incantation, and psychological warfare all at once. Blasphemy made holy. Maerund offers the following meditative keys regarding the spiritual core of “Sunthema”: “From Neoplatonic theurgy through Orthodox mysticism and semiotic consciousness, ‘sunthemata’ are any and all symbols alive with Divine purpose. In human experience, they serve as rungs on the ladder to our theurgic perfection. God Becomes Man So Man Becomes God. When the key turns and the mind aligns, no thing is ‘thing’ only: what is object can be sign, and what is sign can be symbol. Matter is not ‘matter’ merely. Through the icons of experience, uncreated light may shine with Divine energy. The uncreated and created meet, blurring the difference. ‘To him who overcomes, I will grant to sit with Me on My throne.’ Body and blood. Matter ingodded. Drink His blood. Eat His flesh. Clay turns gold. “This collection of recordings, a work of four wills corded together, is itself a sunthema: catalyzing devotion driven by blistering worship, an adversarial taste for Divine blood, and holy Faustian maniacism. For those with the eyes to see, perceive the sign. Take His throne. Breathe His flame. Become into His telos. The stained-glass window becomes itself when filled with the light of the sun.” Much more could be written regarding the interleaved layers of meaning to be found herein, but perhaps the essence of “Sunthema” is best expressed in the final lines of "Red Crystal Lattice", with which Maerund closes the endeavor: Pneuma, flame, and stone. Water, blood, and bone. Dust and light of Sun. Flesh and God made one. TRACKLIST 1. Deathspiral Of Inherited Suffering - Grailcrushing Wounds 2. Deathspiral Of Inherited Suffering - Resurrectionist 3. Deathspiral Of Inherited Suffering - Houses of Abysmal Masks 4. Elysian Blaze - Ascenturion (17:00) 5. Panegyrist - Twilight Take Our Faces 6. Panegyrist - Luciferous 7. Maerund - HAVAH LAHAYLAH 8. Maerund - Transcendence of the World Through the Cross Inverted 9. Maerund - Manna Pharmakei 10. Maerund - Red Crystal Lattice Artwork by Elijah Tamu / Ikonostasis Art