Some of the brightest burning legends in music are those who slip by without a trace. Paternoster were one of those epic visionaries that will forever have their entrail-smeared handprint smudged across the history of obscure music. Hailing from Vienna, Austria, Paternoster were a band that lasted no longer than two years, but somehow created a sound that to this day has not been paralleled. Fusing Krautrock, the most precocious of prog, the freakout sylings of Pink Floyd’s “Ummagumma,” what was yet to come in the world of DOOM, and the haunting prance of melancholic church music, Paternoster were nearly too holy to be categorized. A wailing Hammond organ complements a guitar that sounds to be fuzzing its way through cobweb-encrusted hallways, which is then accompanied by drums that only a somnambulist could conjure. And the vocals? The bemoaned wails of a eulogist at a priest’s funeral. Lyrics that are so morbidly depressing and tinged with the nihilism of absurdity that they’d send Ozzy limping home with a tear in his eye. Vocalist Franz Wippel howls: “Rooms of darkness without colours/ceiling press you down on the floor/tableware filled up with vomit/lepers freaks and cross eyed traitors/jumping round the bathroom door…” Dirge vocals at their finest. This, ladies and gentlemen, is Paternoster. I recommend that you add this album to your permanent collection. But don’t blame me when they find you with your head in the oven–Paternoster playing in the background.

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