While I may have come across their albums while browsing in record shops in the 90s, I can’t say Celestial Season grabbed my attention enough to have me give them a listen. But if ‘The Secret Teachings’ is anything to go by, their non-aggressive covers don’t tell you the full story of what is contained within. 20 years since their last album, this nearly 30-year-old band are back and hitting the mark with their subtle doom-death as if they never took a break.

The album opens with a super sweet sounding violin melody played by Jiska ter Bals, before Olly Smit and Pim van Zanen bring in “The Secret Teachings of All Ages” guitar melody, which also happens to be accompanied by a piano. But what I really enjoy is when the violins and Stefan Ruiters’s death vocals are combined to give the song the required anguish and levity as the lengthy guitar riffs keep playing on.

“For Twisted Loveless” is a far more straightforward song, as Jason Köhnen fills it with drum rolls over the violins and guitars as the slow death growls add little depth to Lucas van Slegtenhorst’s popping bass line.

An excellent Arabian feel is employed on “The Ouroboros”, bringing to mind visions of desert sands as Elianne Anemaat’s cello plays alongside the violins to give an even heavier feel to the accompanying strings as they soar above the guitars and vocals.

The very short instrumental “Dolores”, composed of violins and acoustic guitar is a suitably haunting interlude before the gentle, yet heavy “Long Forlorn Tears” begins, where the violins continue their haunting melody between verses as the down tuned guitars pick up their pace as the drum’s tempo rises to an allegro from the adagio they use the majority of the time.

Feeling very ballad-like in the way it starts, “Amor Fati” very slowly builds its presence as the layers of instruments are added before vocals finally join in too, all the while the song remains extremely slow with precise delicate notes played.

Middle eastern instruments add flavour to the interlude that is “White Lotus Day”, while “Salt of the Earth” just commences with heavy ponderous guitars and slow guttural vocals before a lead guitar throws itself into the mix with some violin for company as the song plods along, even allowing for a meandering bass solo before returning to course.

Easily the most lively song on the album, “They Saw It Come From the Sky” opens with a very 70’s psychedelic feel to the bass and drums, before the even trippier guitars join in to give the whispered death vocals a chance to have their say. Remaining on theme, “Lunar Child” maintains an interesting bass line while the guitars and vocals are far simpler in composition and pace.

The third and final short interlude “Beneath the Temple Mount” is acoustic guitar over pleasant bird song.

“A Veil of Silence” is an exquisite mixture of violins and sustained guitar, before a heady bass line comes in, joined by a simple drum tempo to keep the momentum going on this instrumental before the lead guitar gets into full swing.

Kitty Staunton lends her voice to the Type O cover “Red Water”, on which they end the album. and I must admit that they get all the doomy heaviness into the music without any apparent effort, the death vocals meld perfectly with the clean female vocals to give the song a different perspective by separating Pete Steele’s depth and clearly audible vocals.

I really enjoyed this album, and as their first two albums appear to be as highly regards as some of my favourites of all time, I shall certainly make a plan to listen to them and see if they are as good as this one is.

(8/10 Marco Gaminara)

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https://celestialseason.bandcamp.com/album/the-secret-teachings-2