Mourning Beloveth 'A Disease for the Ages'

Do they ever fail to deliver? Album after album, Mourning Beloveth continues to not only impress fans of the genre, but be one of the only bands left really pushing the artistic limits of Death / Doom metal while never succumbing to tedium or a lack in originality. Some people would consider the third and fourth albums to perhaps be the most important for a long-standing band's career. A test against time, two albums that show that the band wasn't just a fluke with passion in the beginning. Mourning Beloveth have stood in the face of this test with fists clenched, and where the brilliance of 2005's “A Murderous Circus” left off, the band has once again picked up with Grau Records behind them to release probably the most anticipated and well-received Doom album of 2008, even coming in front of that near perfect “Lost to the Living” by Daylight Dies on Candlelight Records.

It would seem the Irish scene has more to offer, as small as it is, than perhaps any other country out there today. Besides Mourning Beloveth, another small doom act is one of the up-and-coming greats right behind them, called Graveyard Dirt. Even away from doom, we have Cruachan on the folk front, and Primordial on the blackened metal territoriy. Even just remaining with doom though, it would seem that many continue showing their face including Wreck of the Hesperus and another Grau Records great, Mael Mórdha, whom we last heard from last year with “Gealtacht Mael Mórdha”.

But at the helm of them all still stands Mourning Beloveth with their incredibly strong production and crushing distortion. What they possess that so many other bands lack in the genre is something that can't be taught or learned – It is the spirit of doom metal to begin with. Something that can only come to you not only through mental strain, but, at least in my opinion, geographical ancestory. Ireland has such a strong doom front because of the mere nature of not only the historical and cultural tendencies surrounding the land, but the atmosphere of their territories to begin with. To breathe that air, every day, that mysticism, should bring something to a musician that is inevitably priceless. Beauty withers locked with melancholy in Ireland, and if there was ever proof of that, you have to look no further than this depressive masterpiece. Hands down, one of the best releases of 2008, most likely to be topping most of the doom categories for most 'zines at the end of the year.

Heathen Harvest