| Kauan was formed in 2005 by Anton Belov and Alexander Borovykh in Chelyabinsk, nearly 2,000 kilometers east from Moscow into Russia’s heartland. As a young, passionate music lover in a city lacking a music scene, Belov began writing music early, looking to the Ural Mountains and endless plains surrounding the city for inspiration.
As a teenager listening to European metal, Belov was drawn to the lyrical delivery of Finnish metal bands, whose vowel-heavy language made for powerful vocals both sung and screamed. He adopted Finnish for his then unnamed project, not just for its sonorous qualities, but because the meaning of the language, spoken by so few, wouldn’t color the listener’s interpretation of his music. By the age of 16, Belov had written KAUAN’s debut LP, Lumikuuro, an atmospheric doom and black metal album Belov recorded with Borovykh and later released on BadMoonMan Records. He chose the name KAUAN—“For a long time” in Finnish—as it implied both the passage of time and anticipation. The album featured Belov’s somber and soulful clean vocals alongside sinister rasps, as well as many of the signature synthesizer tones and nature-evocative folk arrangements that would appear across subsequent KAUAN releases. It also established Belov’s unique ability to seamlessly contrast crushing metal and moments of quiet emotive introspection. Meer... |
| Marja Mattlar & Anton Belov
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Anton Belov (born 3 February 1989) is a songwriter, singer, multi-instrumentalist musician, and record producer from Chelyabinsk, Russia, who moved to Kyiv, Ukraine in 2010 and is now located in Helsinki, Finland. He founded the ambient post-metal project KAUAN and studio-only project Helengard and released instrumental music under his name. Anton started playing guitar and composing music in the early 2000s, around the same time as his growing interest in the Finnish language and culture. Together with Alexander Borovykh, they formed the studio-only project KAUAN in 2007 and signed with Solitude Productions with their first album, Lumikuuro. Anton chose the Finnish language for the lyrics and vocal parts because of the aesthetics and beauty of its sound. Since then, most of his works have been done in Finnish. In 2010, Anton moved to Kyiv, Ukraine, where he turned KAUAN into a full line-up band and toured around the EU and Ukraine up to 2018. In 2017, Anton started his solo self-titled instrumental project and collaborated with Finnish poet and songwriter Marja Mattlar, who wrote lyrics for KAUAN’s album Kaiho. Later the same year, they recorded the EP “Kohti,” for which Anton made arrangements and production. In 2019, he moved to Tallinn, Estonia, technically turning KAUAN into a studio-only project. Later, in 2021, he formed a new line-up by moving again to Helsinki, Finland, and now the band is playing live again. |