Metal Reviews

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A fair review. I would have scored this in the higher 80's.

It's a rather hit or miss album for my own personal tastes. Kneel is obviously a badass track that captures to a lesser degree (minus the epicness, I guess) of Barghest. Hail Odysseus is rather cool too. I guess I just prefer my doom these days to be a little more crushing. I fell for MDB due to the dark romantic elements, and Dreadful Hours can't be touched on that. It is everything I'll ever need on that note.

haven't checked these guys out since Line of deathless kings, and I thought that was ok.

This band is one of my top ten favorite bands of all time so I guess I'm pretty biased. I love everything they do and I always feel like the extra time it takes to digest their albums is well worth it. I think this review is great cause it's a genre that is not for everyone. The songs are long and brooding and you have to dig that style to like it. The Barghest O' Whitby IMO is the best EP of all time. It barely edges out Cosmic Requiem for me. Yeah that's right, Cathedral baby, R.I.P. This album is awesome. It's no Barghest, but that was an EP of legendary status. I would give this album an 88.

If you guys haven't seen this, you should check it out. Hilarious!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsMKOx6fumc

What the heck does that have to do with this topic?

Anyway, thanks for the review Zad. I was pretty let down by this album, even though I'll score it about where you did. Like voxmonster, trapt, and you hinted at, Barghest was a monster of an ep. Kneel to Doomsday (the heaviest track on the album) was the preview track they released, and Andy Craighan (their guitarist) indicated this album would be similarly epic and feature the same mix of vocal stylings. But it turns out he was wrong: those heavier tracks apparently were pushed to an ep later this year. He also said this softer style would be the style of their full-lengths for the foreseeable future. And that is a shame, because the band has always been at their best when they maximize the dynamics between clean and harsh vocals. Barghest, Turn Loose the Swans, The Dreadful Hours, all these recordings are unparalleled in their subgenre of doom, unlike A Map of All Our Failures.

That said, it does resemble, in some of its best moments (I liked the title track's lyrical gloom and Abandoned as Christ's surprising minimalism most) the band's best clean vocal album, The Angel and the Dark River. The problem is this album usually refracts back through lesser recent clean vocal albums like Line of Deathless Kings or For Lies I sire to get back towards Angel and the Dark River. Furthermore, the impressive thing about MDB's first three full albums was the rapid progression in each: As the Flower Withers is basically slow death metal, and The Angel...is light, almost gothic doom, with Turn Loose the Swans serving as the bridge between the two. That stark change probably made Angel and the Dark River more memorable than it would have otherwise been.

And now with all those early albums long since past, and the clear strength of the heavier Light at the End, Dreadful Hours, Songs of Darkness trilogy in comparison to the weaker, softer albums before and after them, I don't have as much patience for another Angel and the Dark River, as great as that album was back in its time. The real strength of the band is the atmosphere and night/day dynamics demonstrated in Barghest, supported from by far the most talented drummer among their peers (Shaun Steels is so good in the studio that David Grey, formerly of Akercocke, now plays live for them). While A Map is extremely well executed, and worth several listens, it is not the album I wanted, nor is it the album that demonstrates their greatest potential. If you preferred Barghest like I did, hopefully the ep next year will deliver similarly.

Couldn't have said it better.

I'll probably end up buying The light at the end of the world, mainly for nostalgic reasons. Good album. As the flower withers had its moments, I just CANT get into them fanatically because Aaron's vocals are so moody.

Yeah unfortunately Aaron's vocals are an acquired taste. However, they do convey a true sense of tragedy and despair.

I see Tehom's side of it. Aaron's vocals are often a minus to their music (though a plus in other moments), but I've always been of the opinion that their dynamics and musicianship, at least on their best albums, outweigh that.