Having fallen into the gloomy pit of Nightfell’s first collection of post-apocalyptic dirges last year I was looking forward to having my hopes and dreams dashed against their gigantic riffs and off-beat melodies for a second time. While I wouldn’t rank doom-death as my first and last passion, I’ve always been partial to a bit of My Dying Bride, Doom VS and Draconian – and fans of those bands would not be disappointed here. But beyond that comparisons are a little hard to pinpoint and probably as much in the realm of melodic death metal as doom. Nightfell’s thing is that they take a more thickly blackened approach with an extra teeth-jarring edge – filling in the fuzzy edges of their reverberating guitars with black metal mechanics and an approach to variable speed that might have a lot of doom purists struggling to catch their breath.
It’s a style that’s refreshingly unique as well as claustrophobic – like being trapped in a bunker after the bombs have fallen, reduced to clutching at keepsakes and trying to make sense of why the system has failed. With their previous effort, The Living Ever Mourn, this Portland, Oregon, duo managed to produce an album that was effortlessly inventive in a way that a lot of generic bands seem to sidestep as if transgressing a few stylistic boundaries was like stepping in dog poo. My biggest disappointment this time round is the lack of an ‘Empty Prayers’-style threnody – a burning, cleanly sung highlight of the last album that helped hammer home a sense of where the band was coming from.
There are, of course, still some side-winding surprises to be had along the way here even if they’re a little harder to dig out this time. Because Darkness Evermore is a back to basics approach to the band’s sound (if that’s possible after two outings) that discards some of the gothic frills of the first album. It’s a heavier reliance on their basic sound – tumbling percussion and monolithic riffs backed by hoarse, dread-filled growls.
The focus on the songs themselves rather than the ambience is perhaps unsurprisingly given Nightfell preparing for live dates and maybe needed some big, no-nonsense tunes to flatten crowds. And if Nightfell can perform tracks like Rebirth and Collapse live with the same vigour and verve they have here then I suspect audiences will indeed be floored. Spinning off subtly powerful hooks like a hearse-driven Pantera but with a darkly enveloping black metal edge and the faint whiff of a return to polytheistic ritualism lingering all the way through.
Darkness Evermore can at first feel like a giant riff-fest, and indeed in some respects it is. The first three of the four main tracks slug it out for supremacy as Tim Call and Tom Burdette demonstrate why they feel this music is ready to hit the live circuit. The final of those three, Rebirth, hits like a bomb blast – with the dread-filled shrapnel vocals cutting through whatever reverie you may have sunk into during the final minutes of the previous track. But there is more to come. And, as if demonstrating they can throw surprises at you even when you least expect it, the final 12 minutes proves to be the real show stopper – even harking back to the heady delights of the last album.
Darkness Evermore courses on its mesmerising drive forward to that eventual release from its oppressive clutches as the hint of ecclesiastical melody finally finds its way to the surface on Eulogy. That leads beautifully into the final track Collapse – which, if you’ve sunk far enough into the sound at this point, you may well do.
Anyone expecting an outright repeat of The Living Ever Mourn may struggle with Darkness Evermore at first. Its predecessor set some high standards and was a great curtain raiser for the band’s airless, blackened doom. But Darkness Evermore still manages to snap at its heels with some huge tracks. Musical call-backs both within this and also back to the previous album are used to good effect. As are the occasional use of layered vocals, fleeting breaks and use of acoustic instruments helping the nine-minute tracks suck you into their gigantic time warp.
What is more, this latest release is just more, well, metal – albeit metal wrapped in black, gloomy velvet. The key to Nightfell’s latest effort is whether this blackened doom sound alone cuts it for you as a method of submersion. I couldn’t shake the feeling that it at times felt a little bit like an EP – like they’re only just getting going and struggling to break out of a slightly one-dimensional sound here. But there’s also a singular, confident purpose. And that’s what this album boils down to – either you will sink helplessly into Nightfell’s reverberating glory or you won’t. But either way, this is definitely a band that deserves more recognition for both its their individual sound and their ability to deliver nine-minute long tracks that are both crushing and often hairline-subtle at the same time.
(8/10 Reverend Darkstanley)
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