This is the third album by the Finnish quintet that was formed 25 years ago by Memnoch. It consists of five songs, with an average length of over 10 minutes, which does work rather well for the style of music being played.

The trumpet blasts and stings are joined by heavy guitar to give “Cold as Winter Storm” an epic black metal tinged with symphonic elements, but it’s the low drawn out doom-death vocals that work far better than rasping shrieks would, by allowing the pace to remain gentle as the strings caress your ear before Tjodalv’s drums rattle them with occasional blasts of speed. Mind you Memnoch does use some harsh rasping towards the end of the song, but it’s well timed and adds rather than detracts from the overall feel.

Memnoch and Elvorn’s guitars on “Chronicle of the Dead” are slow but heavy, even when they get choppy, they maintain their overall slow feel to match the sustained keyboard notes while Makhashanah accentuates the drum cadence on his bas as the song flows on.

“Mirror of Sorrow” is filled with brass and tinkling keys as it winds itself over the vocals with the guitars building to a crescendo as the drumming gets a little ferocious.

Easily the fastest song on the album, “Djevelens Lys” still slows for pauses, but for the most part the tremoloed guitars give the illusion of speed as the riffs are played, but it’s the beautiful piano pieces that take your breath away.

The final track “Brought Forth in Iniquity” is just shy of twenty minutes, and while it does progress through a few movements, it is extremely slow and drawn out with plenty of piano and orchestrations by André Aaslie for added ambience, so it kinda percolates in the background while you are listening to it, rather than bubbling ferociously vying for your attention.

While the pace and delivery scream doom and gloom, there’s still a haunting beauty to the whole album, which makes it a pleasure to listen to.

(8/10 Marco Gaminara)

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https://osmoseproductions.bandcamp.com/album/brought-forth-in-iniquity