Metal Archives lists Usnea as “Blackened Funeral Doom Metal” which instantly coloured me interested. Having snapped up this album into my digital library after hearing the track ‘Eidolons and the Increate’ on the April Fallen playlist, I was eager to explore the whole record in some more critical detail. A backlog of albums to review that seems to only get longer, has meant that I am only just now getting around to dumping my thoughts into type. Thankfully though, this period has not seen any of my initial enthusiasm for Portals Into Futility dulled at all. When your band sounds like a cross between Bell Witch and Graves at Sea, you are guaranteed to drag a smile out of my otherwise grizzled expression. That’s right, music that explores the hopelessness of existence, the depravity of a dystopian world whilst also introducing themes of cosmic horror is a pleasing concept to me. A sort of much needed dose of reality being laid bare alongside some extra metaphors to really underline what a shitshow this planet is most of the time.

Whilst I may have just laid praise at Usnea’s door for their blunt summary of life, it is the more cosmic sound to their funereal atmospheres that I think keeps me more interested. Portals Into Futility has a clever way of hinting things always have the capacity to get worse, to spiral further out of our control, to reach levels of despondency that are frankly unearthly. Whilst I am going to flat-out challenge the “blackened” description of their sound, the sterility of their bleaker passages of music simply asks, “is this is as good as things get this side of the dirt”? It is perhaps only their general disdain for life that I can match to any blackened references that are inferred. Vocally, there is a definitive desperation to how Joel or Justin (both appear to be credited for the vocals) deliver their musings. Yet I would not compare this to anything in the black metal realm, if anything they are clearly more sludge orientated. The guitars also may possess a swarming quality on tracks such as ‘Lathe of Heaven’ but he pacing here is very much funeral doom or glacial sludge riffs.

Give me the murky and unfathomable depths of ‘Demon Haunted World’ all day, any day and I will gladly bathe in them until that mire is engrained in my skin. When that Bell Witch bass kicks in I am in utter joy on this track even if it suggests one of the more positive sounding moments on the whole album (that’s how bleak this thing is). The album artwork (which Justin is also credited with collaboration on – busy chap) sums up the contents perfectly. Ultimately, there is no comfort to be found is what that artwork says to me, and Portals Into Futility is an uncomfortable listen. Closing with a punishing, nineteen-minute track shows that the end is more agonising than the run up. Buckle up folks. Strap on in. This is going to be a rough one.

I think we can all agree in the Dark Moor fanbase that the Elisa C. Martin era is the best. The albums from that era certainly beat the ones with Alfred Romero on vocals, though I still like the new era too. Shadowland is a solid start, and The Gates of Oblivion is the fan favorite. For me personally, the highest peak in their production and classical-infused symphonic power metal sound has to be their second album, The Hall of the Olden Dreams!

The production quality is crystal clear compared to Shadowland, and the neoclassical guitar shredding has the right amount of flavor. Nothing sounds distant. And those vocals by Elisa C. Martin pack a punch in every song.

The intro "The Ceremony" starts the album sounding like it came fresh out of the Old School RuneScape soundtrack. There was a time when I was focusing on more modern and heavier genres and put those instrumentals down as cheesy and sh*tty. But now I can appreciate the classical majesty, just like in the good ol' days of over a decade before this review. Then we really blast off into "Somewhere in Dreams". When I first encountered that song all those years ago, it was love at first hearing. I knew I had to listen to the rest of the album and the band's material right away. It's one of my favorite Dark Moor songs to this day and I'll never get tired of it. "Maid of Orleans" is another popular song from Dark Moor's earlier era, following the 1990s/2000s E-flat-tuned power metal trend. Some of the best vocals by Elisa appear in "Bells of Notre Dame", especially in the verses. She can belt out her vocal melodies that perfectly align with the emotional conflict depicted in the lyrics. And those vocals fit well with the guitar rhythm too. If Disney decides to make a live-action remake of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, they better include that song in the soundtrack.

Also showing their production improvement is "Silver Lake". The fast riffing and soloing makes the song another highlight in the album and possibly the band. As perfect as this album is, I admit that there's a bit of steam lost in "Mortal Sin". It's still great though. "The Sound of the Blade" has some nice variation as a softer ballad. Adding more variety on the heavier side is "Beyond the Fire" which I enjoy for its lean into Stratovarius-esque territory.

The one track that really threatens the album's perfection is "Quest for the Eternal Flame". The riffing by Enrik Garcia doesn't sound as majestic as the earlier tracks. At least Martin is holding the track up with her vocals, though the verses are losing their flow. The keyboard melodies sound a bit repetitive. And the chorus doesn't sound quite inspired or inspiring. Believe me, I was THIS close to giving this album 4.5 stars. Luckily, "Hand in Hand" saves the day as a fantastic closing track with its divine choruses, riffing, and soloing. I also love the Bach-sampled guitar/keyboard fiddling in the bridge (the same as in Children of Bodom's "The Nail").

I would also recommend the edition released in Korea that includes "The Fall of Melnibone", a 10-minute epic based on the Elric of Melnibone, though I don't enjoy the ballad "Wood's Song" as much. Either way, I highly recommend The Hall of the Olden Dreams for any fan of Dark Moor and power metal. This is where they truly leave their mark!

Favorites: "Somewhere in Dreams", "Bells of Notre Dame", "Silver Lake", "Beyond the Fire", "Hand in Hand", "The Fall of Melnibone" (bonus track)

The transition for Gaerea from Season of Mist to Century Media Records has become a tumultuous one. The melodic black metal band who had previously released two high quality albums (Mirage and Coma) have done away with a significant portion of what made those albums so special and replaced them with mostly watered down melodic metalcore trends. Now Century Media Records does have a strong class of artists who release music under their label, but not many of them can be truly categorized as black metal. But it does seem like that has been changing in the last couple of years. In fact, the band who Gaerea beat out for this review spot, Blessings and Curses by Non Est Deus, are also signed to Century Media Records! But calling Gaerea exclusively black metal is a disservice to the band. Their last two albums had a lot of progressive and post-metal elements infused, which made them stand out, and that's before you start with the obvious melodic death metal hybrid.

Now on Loss, Gaerea have decided to turn down the black metal from before and make it more accessible. The death metal influence that was previous before has taken center stage and could even be debated that their sound has moved closer to that of the heavier melodic metalcore bands like Bleed From Within. And with that comes clean vocals... and they don't sound very good at all. Clean singing has its place in metal music, even extreme metal music, but more often than not, these modern bands try to replicate the Chester Bennington pitched singing with a rasp and it sounds terrible. Chester could do it well for two reasons: the first was these singing moments were usually the apex of the song dynamically. The second was that most of the time, he sung in a hushed, clean timbre without rasp and they would be more impactful. Part of the reason why "Stardust" works is because the vocals enter over a hushed, Sleep Token-esque electronic backdrop, then after a while, the band enters and crushes the listener with blast beats and tremolo picking guitars and powerful vocals. There is strong variety here and the quasi scream/sing chorus becomes more impactful.

Unfortunately this is not the case for the rest of the album. Once the listener has an idea as to what Loss is going to sound like after the first two tracks, the listener can turn their brain off and let the atmosphere take them away. They might be surprised by a clean guitar break during a songs interlude, but they can also be assured that the volume and monotone vocals will return momentarily. And this happens every time! From "Cyclone" to " Nomad" and "Phoenix", you would be hard-pressed to name one distinct feature between the three. I think the most disappointing aspect of Loss is that, structurally, it sounds solid. But the execution is so severely lacking and I don't know whether to blame the band themselves, or Century Media, which have lost a lot of favour with me in the past three years (see my Orbit Culture Death Above Life review).

Best Songs: Submerged, Stardust

For Fans Of: Bleed From Within, Harakiri for the Sky, Groza

I first encountered Germany's Bethlehem through the mid-90's tape trading scene through their 1993 demo tape & 1994 debut album "Dark Metal" (both of which I quite liked) which led me to track down their sophomore record "Dictius te necare" through the same channels once it hit the shelves. It saw Bethlehem adjusting their sound somewhat, mainly off the back of a lineup change that saw vocalist/keyboardist Andreas Classen (Darkened Nocturn Slaughtercult/Shining) being replaced by new front man Rainer Landfermann (Pavor) whose psychotic howls are the main talking point with this release. The blackened doom metal instrumentation isn't all that different to what we heard on "Dark Metal" but it's the over-the-top theatrics of Landfermann that the clear focal point & will ultimately decide on your reaction to "Dictius te necare" as I think it's fair to say that he's more than a little divisive. He is also the main catalyst for the album's DSBM credentials as he sounds like he's in all sorts of agonizing pain on these seven tracks. Personally, I think the album needs him too as the riffs & single-guitar lineup aren't all that exciting but I do really enjoy the deep, stripped-back atmospheric material that pops up from time to time on most tracks. The doomier material is also where I think Bethlehem are at their best with lengthy closer "Dorn meiner Allmacht" being the clear album highlight in my opinion. I can't subscribe to the general consensus that "Dictius te necare" is some sort of classic release but it's certainly worth a listen for those with a penchant for the doomier & more depressive side of black metal.

For fans of Silencer, Shining & Forgotten Tomb.

When it comes to weird experimentation (avant-garde metal or otherwise), I prefer when the non-metal influences aren't the main focus and the band has some metallic heaviness to balance things out. That's the problem I had with the 1982 Warning album. 4 decades later, a different band would get it all right within their progressive/tech-death sound, and that is Australian band Growth!

Extreme metal in the 2020s seems to lack experimentation for the sake of going the mainstream route. Growth makes up that in their debut The Smothering Arms of Mercy. It is the first album in an ongoing trilogy that would be continued over 5 years later in their next album Under the Under.

The debut album already gives you a great deal of dissonance in the opening "Cigarette Burns". Things get rough and tough in the furious growls and neck-breaking blast-beats. It is nothing short of a dark twisted frenzy. "The Treatment for Melancholy" isn't as melancholic as the title would imply, as the speed and intensity is leveled up. There's wild guitarwork while making room for mesmerizing melody. "Fortress of Flesh and Bone" takes a break from the face-punching action, starting off softer and more captivating. But don't think you're safe from the monster in the shadows as it lurks around for the right time to attack. Before you know it, the monster of aggression would strike and rip out your heart, leaving it hanging from its teeth, like in the title of this next track...

"Our Lady of the Hanging Heart" is more experimental while flowing in this storm of dissonance. Each instrument has its time to shine, and eventually they all combine to make an intense vortex of destruction. "Lead Us to Our Glorious Times" is more chaotic within the screamed vocals, guitars, and drumming that are all so crushing. Soon we get some clean melodic singing to show a less savage side of vocalist Luke Frizon. "Darkly, It Tightens Its Grip" doesn't loosen the band's grip on how much they can do in the many demonic twists. There's wild riffing hellfire with only glimpses of light in the darkness.

"Soul Rot" has more ferocious riffing and drumming to penetrate your ears and brain to make you find the structural construction and deconstruction worth appreciating. "Something Follows" continues the pulverizing dissonance while having some haunting riffing atmosphere. "Gird Your Loved in Armour While Yet You Wither" is the 11-minute closing gauntlet, and they're not gonna leave peacefully. The technical fury is here to stay until the very end.

If I had stumbled upon this album at the time of its release in late 2020, I'm not sure if I could've made it through this hour of brutality and seldom beauty back then. Now I can, since I've become more experienced with this sound and can find some heavy treats there. The Smothering Arms of Mercy shows Growth without mercy or limits!

Favorites: "Cigarette Burns", "Fortress of Flesh and Bone", "Our Lady of the Hanging Heart", "Darkly, It Tightens Its Grip", "Gird Your Loved in Armour While Yet You Wither"