It is my principle to never pass on anything which contains at least 10 seconds of wall of sound. I go gogo and gaga and agog and amok for that stuff. I had a half mind to spare you this comparison, but I just couldn’t help myself, particularly when presented with raw atmospheric black metal from Ukraine.

First song Sunrise Will Come is very Sadness meets Evilfeast but with slower and more blastalicious drums (the rhythm is set by the keys with the drums being quite static). The composition is impeccable: clean serene intervals lead to the highest highs succeeded by the lowest lows, again and again, with each one escalating the previous just a little bit more, like those meme videos that speed up once a word is repeated. It’s all very satisfying. This piece meshes two of my favourite black metal projects together and I just cannot find anything wrong with it at all, even if I were to try really hard. Which, for context, I did do in the spirit of critical analysis. This is the only piece whose lyrics I could find, and they make for a beautiful read – and one steeped in hope for a brighter future for Ukraine.

Second piece Sons of Steel Will is where the action really begins – but this is also where some composition flaws start to appear. The track begins with a bit of a WITTR-esque flair, with synchronised 4/4 time signatures for guitars and drums, then the epic post black metal guitars reappear and mish-mash with the base beat leading to a surprisingly raw result, which, coupled with the shouting multi-layered vocals makes it sound almost like a protest chant. My main misgiving however are the digi soundtrack-to-a-hacking-scene style synths, particularly at the end. They are very Mesarthim-esque, and I get it, cosmic black metal is the de facto genre of the year, but, in my opinion, they’re quite pointless here.

To the Stars! starts off very strong with a menacing guitar intro which is followed by unrelenting blast beats and ice cold synths. Now, this sounds more like cosmic black metal. Like Eternal Valley featuring the Evilfeast and Sadness concoction – and it really works. This is a shorter piece as compared to the previous two, but it’s also the crescendo of the release, its arc de triomphe. It’s a fast, impassioned elegy, and it hits all the right spots, and then finishes seemingly as soon as it began.

Penultimate And Winter In My Heart starts with an intro using the same digi-sounding synths that I disliked in Sons Of Steel Will – and once again, they really make no sense at all. They don’t fit in well with the succeeding melody, and I’m just really puzzled about how an otherwise perfect composition insists so adamantly on trying to use them. Here, I have to mention that I don’t have issue with most of the synths in this album – just the digi-sounding ones. That aside, this is a slower piece, the silence after the storm, the solemn conclusion of the battle. Then the piece ends with the digi-synths again and the final one begins – again with them.

Frozen Moment is a fully synth number, an outro that, at nearly 9 minutes, is unusually hefty. And, while I have nothing against it, or instrumental outros for that matter, I kind of wish it was omitted. I feel like it’s mocking my expectation for a jubilant conclusion after the calm And Winter In My Heart, yet it left me with empty promises and futile hopes. I’m wondering if this is a metaphor for the war in Ukraine. The end that seems to be forever out of sight.

Anyway, go listen to this album. It’s truly a good one, one of the best rawer atmospheric black metal albums in years. Any misgivings I have with [some of the] synths, pale in comparison with how much I enjoyed listening to it again and again, and hopefully for a while longer.

(8/10 The Flâneur)

https://www.facebook.com/severoth

https://avantgardemusic.bandcamp.com/album/by-the-way-of-light