Mourning
Beloveth 'The Sullen Sulcus'
With their debut album Dust, Mourning Beloveth took the doom/death metal
template forged by the likes of My Dying Bride and infused it with a level
of heart and soul previously unseen and unheard of within this sub-genre.
The result was an epic heart-wrenching jaw-dropper of an album that simply
made the vast majority of bands playing this style look like nothing more
than bogus posers. The Irish band now return with their second effort, and
what we have on offer here with The Sullen Sulcus is essentially second
helpings off the same plate but with a refined recipe.
Mourning Beloveth have fine-tuned and honed their monstrous monolithic
sound, tightened the loose ends and have once again laid down a decimating
slab worthy of the admiration and envy of every doom/death band out there.
Whereas some of the songs on Dust relied on riffs that were churned out a
little more often than they should have been, there's no excessive
repetition on this release. Truly incredible compositions like 'Narcissistic
Funeral' and 'My Sullen Sulcus' are well muscled and superbly balanced, with
the ideas staying fresh and never staling. The wandering guitar solos and
melodic riffs that pockmarked the first album are now more commonplace,
making The Sullen Sulcus a more melodic and almost more colourful affair
than the debut. The true strength of their work lies in their ability to
perfectly capture the essences of grief and despondency, the aim all doom
bands aspire to but, compared to these guys, never really attain. This is
what doom should sound like - immensely heavy, intricately melodic,
multi-layered, but above all emotional. If you're not feeling it, the band
aren't doing their job, and Mourning Beloveth are one of the few bands that
can make you feel miserable even when you're not.
One of the best aspects of their sound is the amazing use of heartfelt clean
vocals, the lamenting tones of the singing really putting a human face on
the misery and sorrow. Unfortunately, they seem to have less of a prominence
here, with Mourning Beloveth opting to let more of their death metal
elements come to the fore. Not necessarily a bad thing in itself, especially
as the band now sound more aggressive on this recording, particularly on
'Anger's Steaming Arrows' where they seem to be spitting bile rather than
shedding tears. But when the clean vocals are used however, the result is
once again magnificent, with the band elevating far above the mediocre and
almost sounding as if their microphone jacks are plugged straight into the
emotional nerve centre of your being. 'It Almost Looked Human' is an
excellent example, as well as 'The Words That Crawled' where a
choral/harmony style approach is used to marvellous effect.
As always, six songs over 65 minutes makes for a truly trying and exhausting
experience to get through in one sitting, but perhaps there's some solace in
the fact that it's not the length of the material that'll get you down but
the sheer despair and melancholy it deals with. Mourning Beloveth have
confirmed their position as one of the most depressingly exciting doom bands
to emerge in recent years, with this being a touch more aggressive and
melodic release. But with the reduced role of the clean singing though, the
band seem to have taken a bit of the sheen off their brightest spark,
meaning The Sullen Sulcus isn't perhaps quite as stunning as its
predecessor, but is still an excellent recording in its own right.
Kev Truong
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