Lacrima Mortis

An idea from the end of the 1990s

Lacrima Mortis formed in Blumenau, Brazil, in 2016, reviving death/doom ideas that founder Requiem had first imagined around the end of the 1990s alongside his earlier band Dying Embers.

Requiem traces the underlying idea to the end of the 1990s, when it briefly existed beside his former band Dying Embers. Personal changes led him to recover those compositions more than a decade later, and Lacrima Mortis took its present form in Blumenau in 2016. The hooded, masked presentation was intentional from the renewed beginning: a way of giving slow ceremonial music a visual presence without centring ordinary individual portraits.

Requiem traced the first idea for Lacrima Mortis to the end of the 1990s, when it existed briefly beside his band Dying Embers. Dying Embers had begun in 1997, produced demos and remained active for roughly a decade without completing the intended debut. Lacrima Mortis did not continue uninterrupted from that period; Requiem explicitly described the 2016 group as a rebirth after personal changes brought him back to the old compositions.

Rebirth in Blumenau, 2016

Requiem recruited Scavenger, Baud, Dread and Reverend Reaper, and the 2017 EP Optare Mortem became the first release. Robes, masks and a ceremonial stage image were conceived as part of the presentation from the outset.

The new group formed in Blumenau in March 2016 amid lineup changes. Requiem recruited drummer Scavenger, coworker Baud on guitar, vocalist Dread through Scavenger and bassist Reaper through an online contact. The 2017 EP Optare Mortem, limited physically and received especially abroad and in Eastern Europe according to Requiem, gave the lineup its first public form.

Masks, robes and southern Brazilian stages

The band developed slow ceremonial death/doom with Gregorian elements, personal grief and a theatrical visual language. Regional doom networks in southern Brazil provided an important live context.

Robes and masks were present as a visual concept from the beginning, influenced by the stage impact of acts such as Sunn O))), The Funeral Orchestra and Tyranny, but also chosen for practical coherence. The band played regional events including Eclipse Doom in Curitiba and São Paulo and SC Metal Fest, sharing a southern Brazilian doom network. The image should not obscure that Lacrima Mortis rehearsed as a functioning group rather than a studio-only project.

Recording Posthumous

Posthumous was prepared from 2018 and released in May 2020. Its nine tracks combine older material with new compositions and frame life, death, anguish, sadness and anger as a connected album statement.

Posthumous was recorded in late 2018 and early 2019 at Sonority Studio and spent much of the following year in mixing. Fernando Cebola and Requiem produced, recorded, mixed and mastered the work; Fernando Nahtaivel supplied keyboards, Laurent Poki narration and additional harsh vocals, and Gregorian voices were used as part of the ceremonial texture. The nine tracks were released on 27 May 2020.

Work on Posthumous began in the second half of 2018. Recording took place late that year and early in 2019 at Fernando Cebola’s small studio in a nearby city; mixing continued through 2019. Cebola helped integrate Gregorian chants, testing ideas with the band and discarding those that did not work. The album combines recovered older material with newer songs. Requiem linked its emotional range to lived grief, including his mother’s death from cancer during composition, without claiming the record as a literal autobiography.

The path to Talheim Records

Talheim Records issued Posthumous as TR065CD. The CMS date and contemporary announcement differ by one day, 27/28 May, and require edition-level confirmation.

The route to Talheim Records began indirectly through Requiem’s graphic work for Paolo Bruno of Thy Light. The resulting contact led to the release of Posthumous in May 2020 as TR065CD. Sources differ by one day, 27 or 28 May, which likely reflects announcement and release handling but still requires confirmation. The nine-track album is the first full-length, not the beginning of the underlying material.

After the debut

The band remains listed as active, with later singles and personnel changes documented elsewhere. Current members and the state of the second-album material mentioned in 2020 need first-person confirmation.

Optare Mortem as rehearsal for the album

The two-song EP and intro did more than announce a name. It gave the new lineup a compact set of material, established the ceremonial visual language and made live appearances possible before the album sessions. Requiem later described Posthumous as carrying anguish, sadness and anger across pieces such as Optare Mortem, Words of Blood and Distress & Decadence. The recurrence of the title demonstrates continuity between EP and album, while the fuller production and guest elements mark the later work as a separate statement.