As an early declaration of interest, I should say that I have more than a little love for Danish heavy metal. The Danes are less well known than their Scandinavian cousins when it comes to heavy metal, but truth be told, some of my favourite bands are Danish. Many fans will have heard of the likes of Hatesphere and Illdisposed, I guess, and older chaps (such as myself), will remember Mercyful Fate, Dominus and Konkhra. I was surprised, therefore, to learn that Saturnus – a Danish doom band, (which should be a match made in heaven for me), have been going since 1991. How could it be that such a long-lived outfit could have slipped past my radar? Is it because Saturnus are crap?
Happily, no. Saturnus appear to be a very accomplished outfit. What “Saturn in Ascension” has in spades is atmosphere. It’s all very well producing songs that are long and slow – any fool can do it, after all – but it’s quite another to ensure that the ten plus minutes that are spent with some of these compositions is quality time. It’s essentially the difference between penning an “epic” and composing a bloody long song. Saturnus are apt to do the former. With a gothic penchant for doom-laden atmospheric death metal, there are plenty of parts here that remind me of other bands of course. At this point of time, it’s fairly hard to avoid the long shadows cast by outfits that have come before. In this case, there’s more than a dash of The Blood Divine in Thomas Jensen’s vocals, and in the superb guitar melodies wrought by Rune Stiassny, hints of “The Silent Enigma” era Anathema. All of this should not take away from the originality of much of the album. Tracks like “Litany of Rain” hold an embarrassment of riches, from the perfectly balanced keyboards, to the proficient drum work.
The production also preserves some of that Danish grit, with plenty of bottom end grunt, with the hoarse vocals being presented fairly high in the mix, but not at the expense of the rest of the instruments. There’s plenty here to recommend the album to lovers of the extreme. Though the pace of the album is often quite leaden, there is seldom a feeling that the songs have lapsed into tedium, or outstayed their welcome. It may not be breaking completely new ground, but there are few bands out there who can write and perform this style of music with such apparently effortless aplomb.
(7/10 Chris Davison)
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