Album Review: Ildaruni – Divinum Sanguinem (Black Lion Records)

Ildaruni returns with their second full-length, ‘Divinum Sanguinem’, shifting toward a more tenebrous and ferocious black metal path, moving away from the pagan/folk black metal landscape of their earlier work. The album is set for release on November 7th, 2025 via Black Lion Records, available on CD, vinyl, and across all major digital and streaming platforms.

The shift in style and sound isn’t immediately obvious due to the folkish intro of Mithras Alone Is My Wreath. Where Ildaruni create an immersive pagan soundscape, albeit one with a haunting dark vein running through it. It’s creative and interesting, and then in explosive fashion, The Ascension of Kosmokrator arrives and here, we experience the full might of Ildaruni’s changing black metal ways.

Not only more intense, but delivered with more aggression and ferocity, and even though melody still plays an important part, the blackened fire is what sits front and centre.

It is the first of many creative tracks though, Ildaruni showing off an elevated and detailed style of black metal. Far from traditional, but staying true to a vehement core, and delivered in imaginative horror-laden and fantastical style. From the elaborate Of Nomos and Flaming Flint Stone, where we get some potent guitar soloing, to the ritualistic and impressively atmospheric Forged With Glaive and Blood, the middle part of the album showcases some of Ildaruni’s strongest tracks. A statement given even more weight thanks to the raw power of Zurvan Akrane and the hauntingly heavy Arcane Sermon. The latter of those two is a personal favourite as it has a salacious catchiness that you just don’t expect from black metal.

Black metal, especially the rawest kind, has a habit of becoming quite ‘samey’. Happily, Ildaruni’s ability to blend melody and metal is unparalleled, and when added to the dark atmosphere they like to inject, tracks like Immersion Into Empyrean and Scorching Pathways to Samachi are as powerful as everything that came before. Putting it simply, there’s no getting bored with this record and to cap it all off, there is the gargantuan title track. a furious and powerful finale that proves unequivocally that Ildaruni are so much more than just another folk-infused black metal band.

Ildaruni – Divinum Sanguinem Track Listing:

1. Mithras Alone Is My Wreath
2. The Ascension of Kosmokrator
3. Of Nomos and Flaming Flint Stone
4. Forged With Glaive and Blood
5. Zurvan Akrane
6. Arcane Sermon
7. Immersion Into Empyrean
8. Scorching Pathways to Samachi
9. Divinum Sanguinem

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