Balance is important in everything, and what could provide more balance than reminding yourself of future rainy days at the beginning of summer? Enter Skognatt’s new EP Rain Eternal. The one-man atmospheric black metal project from Augsburg, Germany, behind which stands one Danijel Zambo, will make you think of those grey, foggy, rainy autumn days in no time and thus provide some healthy balance to your newly-gained, post-quarantine enthusiasm.
Already a look at the EP’s cover will cool you down. In composition resembling paintings from the Romantic era, but held entirely in black and grey, it features a lone figure sitting atop of a cliff, an umbrella in hand, trying to ward off the elements in an evidently Sisyphean attempt.
Rain Eternal has five tracks: Rain, Eternal, Fog and two short instrumentals, simply titled I and II, adding up to a total runtime of 20 minutes. There is absolutely no doubt regarding themes here, but the project’s bandcamp page provides further references for those who like to dig deeper. Two poets are listed as authors of the lyrics to tracks Rain and Eternal. The first one is Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, the other one is John Clare. The author of the lyrics for Fog is given as Anonymous.
The music and the vocal performance, just like the themes and the visuals, stick to the atmospheric black metal template. While the lyrics are not really intelligible, once you know the source, you can identify the words to Longfellow’s The Rainy Day and Clare’s An Invite to Eternity. Reading the poems while listening to the music definitely makes for a more intense listening experience.
Rain starts out midtempo, with a steady, slightly dragging rhythm. A tremolo-picked guitar provides some hights and light in the overall down and dreary atmosphere, as does an acoustic passage midway to the track. Instrumental I combines sounds of rain falling, acoustic guitar and keyboards to form a melancholy interlude. Things gain in intensity with Eternal which is faster than Rain, the vocals, overall harsh and throaty, are more menacing, the song structure and the guitar playing more complex. Instrumental II works with the same elements as its counterpart resulting in a similar effect. Fog returns to the same steady, slightly dragging rhythm the EP began with, but the guitar playing changes yet again, creating a slightly different, yearning feel.
Since the project is unsigned and since this is an all-around DIY effort, Skognatt’s new release deserves recognition and can well be called accomplished. However, the EP does not offer anything new. In order to stick out from the sea of atmospheric black metal out there the music would require an edge. Of course, finding an edge in the context of prolonged periods of rain, of bleakness and dreariness, represents quite a challenge.
With its references to poets Longfellow and Clare, Rain Eternal nicely captures and musically replicates the effects prolonged periods of external difficulties can have on a person’s inner life. An engaging cooling agent for a hot summer’s day.
(6.5/10 Slavica)
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