Shape of Despair - Shades Of... (2000)^{Release ID: 1931}

I've never experienced a more emotionally affecting album. Perfectly executed gothic funeral doom!

I must admit that I know very little about Finland. If it wasn’t for metal music, I’m not sure I would have been able to say anything at all about the country, apart from the fact it’s situated somewhere in Scandinavia. But over the last decade or so I find Finland coming up repeatedly when discussing great doom metal bands, with some of my absolute favourite releases coming out of this sparsely populated Nordic country. With bands like Skepticism, Dolorian, Swallow the Sun and Rapture all originating from Finland, I’d consider packing my bags and heading on over there immediately if it wasn’t for the fact that they all seem so damn depressed. There must be something in the water to make these grown men wallow in such highly emotional and dejected states, but I have to say I’m extremely grateful for it. You can add Shape of Despair to that list of Finnish doom metal bands above and with a name like that there’s no doubt they’ve been drinking from the same source. I’ll say upfront that Shape of Despair is my favourite band of all time. That statement covers all genres whether they be metal or not and includes such wonderful acts as Opeth, Emperor, My Dying Bride, Death, Burzum, Saturnus and Morbid Angel, all of which have created multiple incredible albums that hold an important place in my life. Yet none of them have managed to touch me as deeply and as consistently as this relatively unknown funeral doom metal band from Finland.

Now that you know where I stand when it comes to Shape of Despair, it won’t be any surprise when I start blabbering and spewing forth unattainable plaudits before this review ends. While I’m still relatively literate, let’s have a look into the origins of the band. Formed in 1995 by friends Tomi Ullgren (T.U.) and Jarno Salomaa (J.S.), the band was originally called Raven. The duo wrote a few songs together, but it wasn’t until they found a drummer in Tony Mäensivu (T.M) that they were able to record some rehearsal tapes. Over the next couple of years, the members of Raven only sporadically worked on their material, but by 1998 their sound had evolved from simplistic doom to a very deliberate and beautiful synth-based form of funeral doom. They recorded a fifty-minute demo tape called Alone in the Mist in a small 8-track studio, which included early versions of tracks such as Down Into the Stream, Shadowed Dreams, Woundheir and Into the Mist. You can check out this material on their self-titled compilation released in 2005 if you’re interested and while the production values are obviously not particularly high, it’s apparent that the tracks were close to fully formed by this early stage. One thing that remains a mystery to me is who is performing vocals on this demo, as the whispery growls don’t sound like Tony and neither Jarno or Tomi have ever been listed as performing vocals. If anyone knows the answer, I’d be very interested to know!

Alone in the Mist was never actually released to the public or record labels and it’s around this time that a couple of line-up changes occurred with Tony departing and Nathalie Safrosskin (N.S.) joining the band to add female vocals (she had previously been involved with black metal band Tyrant as a keyboard player). This new line-up of J.S, T.U. and N.S. borrowed Thy Serpent’s vocalist Azhemin and set about recording a promo tape in September 1998. The tape, which has programmed drums due to the band not having a drummer at the time, only really contained one track (Quiet These Paintings Are) and a short Outro, but it was enough to impress Spikefarm Records who signed the band immediately. It was at this time that Raven changed their name to Shape of Despair to avoid confusion with the NWOBHM band of the same name, and Tony Mäensivu came back into the fold, this time as a vocalist. A new drummer was found in Finntroll’s Samu Ruotsalainen and they even recruited a session flute player named Johanna Vakkuri, leaving Shape of Despair with a six-strong line-up (J.S.: lead guitars, acoustic guitar and synth. T.U.: rhythm and bass guitars. N.S.: female vocals. T.M.: vocals. S.R.: drums. J.V.: flute), all of whom would enter Hellhole Studios in Helsinki in December 1999. Its here that their debut album Shades of... was recorded over a two-month period with the help of Antti Lindell and Kaide Hinkkala.

I can vividly recall my first experience of Shades of.... I’d become somewhat disgruntled with the state of metal around the turn of the millennium, with many of my favourite bands releasing substandard albums or moving too far from their roots to be recognisable. Thrash metal was completely dead, and the black and death metal scenes had been flooded with clones, making it difficult to get particularly excited about anything. One listen to Shape of Despair’s debut album and everything turned around, not only proving there were bands out there willing to create something unique, but also opening my world to the wonders of funeral doom. The likes of Esoteric and Skepticism would shortly follow, but it’s undoubtedly Shape of Despair that had the biggest impact. Whereas those bands try to either crush you into the soil with minimalistic riffs or take you on a drug-like trip through hellish environments, Shape of Despair aim to pull at your heartstrings, hitting on some deep yet susceptible nerve that reminds us all what it is really like to be human. Never have feelings of loss, sorrow and utter despondency been so effectively manifested in audible form and remained so compellingly uplifting. There’s no doubt in my mind that Jarno and Tomi are emotionally intelligent men, as that’s the only way to explain how consistently they can craft music of this emotional calibre. There’s also no doubt that they surrounded themselves with the perfect musicians to bring their moving ambitions to life.

The duo create a backdrop of deep, hypnotic doom riffs, which on its own would likely achieve very little, but when combined with Jarno’s symphonic layer, Tomi’s very audible bass lines, Sami’s minimal yet perfectly executed percussion, Tony’s immensely deep, overly-emphasised vocals, and in particular Johanna’s pleasing flute and Nathalie’s angelic vocals, makes for a mesmerising amalgamation that is a perfect example of several technically unimpressive elements forming an overwhelmingly beautiful whole. Every single moment of Shades of... feels as though it has been given the utmost attention, with the result being an album that grabs hold of you on multiple levels from the opening moments of ...In the Mist and doesn’t release its grip until the closing ambience of Sylvan Nights. This precision must surely result from the fact that four out of the five tracks were originally written in 1995 (Sylvan Nights is the only track that didn’t appear on the Alone in the Mist demo) before being perfected over the next five years, the band only tinkering with additional sounds and instruments rather than the underlying structures which appear unchanged. Since my discovery of the band over ten years ago, I have spent many an hour delving into the various funeral doom outfits in search of a comparative experience, but I’m yet to find one that sounds anything quite like this, nor do I expect to.

At this point I want to make mention of the two vocalists involved. How on earth Tony was only considered a drummer during his initial period with Raven, I have no idea. His growls are stunningly emotive, satisfyingly guttural, yet entirely decipherable throughout, making him the perfect choice for the underlying music. The way he emphasises each word, holding on to the final syllables as though he is putting every ounce of passion within his being into every single moment, is just awesomely effective without ever becoming grating. Then there’s Nathalie! Whatever I’m about to say, it will unquestionably not do her performance or its effect on this album justice, and that’s considering the fact she never once sings an actual word. Her smooth, angelic voice cascades in and out of tracks and acts merely as an accompanying instrument rather than a focal point, but she accentuates the atmosphere with ease every time she appears. It’s Nathalie’s voice, along with the well utilised flute of Johanna, that take what would still be an excellent funeral doom experience and push it into a realm of beauty I’ve simply not experienced elsewhere in music. Check out around the eight-minute mark of Shadowed Dreams to hear Nathalie harmonising with herself, yet with one voice cascading downwards while the other soars upwards, all coating a beautiful Jarno lead. The result is stunning beyond words!

As mentioned above, the first four tracks on Shades of... are re-recordings of tracks found on their 1998 demo. ...In the Mist is a fantastic opening to the album which fades in gradually, as though it were indeed materialising from the mist, before breaking into the measured stride that remains unwavering for the next hour. Woundheir has a greater emphasis on keyboards and acoustic guitars, and contains neat computer affected, echoing spoken vocals that add another level of mystery to proceedings. Down Into the Stream actually increases the pulse temporarily, which only makes the drop back down to doom all the more effectual, especially when the listener is immediately rewarded with the albums finest Nathalie-Tony combination on arrival. Sylvan Nights is the one new track and it closes Shades of... in the most monolithic way imaginable. After a crushing ten-minute journey into darkness, Jarno’s epic lead work is flawlessly accompanied by Nathalie’s pitch perfect voice, before the album drifts back away on a superb ambient outro. It really is silly to try to compare releases from massively contrasting genres, but I’m pretty sure Shape of Despair’s Shades of... album is the best album I’ve ever heard in my life. If you have even the slightest interest in doom metal, I implore you to track this down, put on your headphones in a dark room, and let this piece of art redefine beauty. Yes, it’s that good!