Evoken - Antithesis of Light Review

Evoken Antithesis of Light

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Tracklist:
1. Intro
2. In Solitary Ruin
3. Accursed Premonition
4. The Mournful Refusal
5. Pavor Nocturnus
6. Antithesis Of Light
7. The Last Of Vitality

Release Date: 2005

user rating

4.3
superb

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recommended by reviewer

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5.0
classic

Hardhat USER (6 Reviews)

2007-02-24 | 32 comments | 1,287 views

Summary: Evoken has created an unmatchable, bottomless pit of Doom Metal that flawlessly combines darkness, despair, beauty, and hope to just the right degrees to pierce your emotions. A Funeral Doom classic.

10 of 10 thought this review was well written

The sky is pale and gray. The land is desolate, and the trees are frail and leafless. A rusted copper fence encircles a lifeless, decaying garden, and crumbling statues are covered with blackened moss. I've never been to this place before, and I doubt I'll ever go back. The place is Doom Metal Eden. The band is Evoken, and in 71 minutes they have achieved Funeral Doom bliss.

Upon your first listen to Evoken, you might ask the same question I did: Why is this such a great band? It seemed as though it had all the typical Funeral Doom elements, but not much more. Slow, crushing guitar? Yes. Low, gutteral roars? Check.. Stagnant, 10 minute long songs? Definitely. But then, Funeral Doom isn't a genre that you can just listen to once and understand completely. It was only upon more listens that I realized the true genius of Evoken and what they do. They bring all the elements of Funeral Doom together, and then maximize them to make one of the most crushing, gloomy, and dreary CD's I have ever heard.

The intro starts the CD off, and you can hear whispering voices around you from all sides. And as the first song starts, you are introduced to the strong music of Evoken. Throughout the whole 70 minutes, the music never lets up it's force, and never sounds flat or unispired. You whirl through a dark castle of fear, hope, despair, and longing. Evoken pulls out your emotions, and they do it well.

The atmosphere that Evoken brings to this CD is unmatched. Brutal chord voicing under gloomy clean guitar intertwined with slow and rythmatic drums take you to place only Evoken can take you. If someone told me that Evoken recorded Antithesis of Light in a cave, I would believe them, because that is exactly what this music sounds like; some dark and gloomy cave in the mountains, where a drop of water echoes down all of it's dim corridors. A cave which there is no escape from, and where hope is just a faded memory.

The keyboard is a great touch too. It lurks quietly in the backround, adding to the unsurpassed bleakness of this CD. And when it chooses to come out, it is so beautiful that for a minute it might give you the illusion of hope, like a line of gray light piercing the dark cave where you are trapped. But just as soon as the beauty is there, the oppressing, lumbering guitar starts again and you are plunged back into Evoken's cave, and into total darkness.

And if you thought the sound couldn't get any more massive, then you don't know Evoken. Because even after all that amazing atmosphere, they still manage to incorporate bass. While not entirely audible, the bass adds depth and intensity to the already gigantic sound. It even gets a few solo parts, such as the intro Accursed Premonition.

The lyrics, much like the music, are depressing, sorrowful. dark, and all the other adjectives that one could use to describe Doom. Focusing on the regular doom topics, Evoken excels in the lyric department while describing things such as shadows, darkness, and death. Not much out of the ordinary, but Evoken's ability to paint vivid pictures often give the words a darker feel. One example is in the title track, where Evoken writes

Eternity has no bottom
It is the breath of a dying sun
Hanging low in the vast nothingness,
Symbol of destiny-mirror of ages.
Eternity is an illusion
Burning quickly away into molecular shadow
There is no measure of it; it's depth in endless

When reading, it's easy to imagine the black, gaping hole that is eternity.

The flaws of this album are nearly impossible to pick out. This really is perfect Funeral Doom. But like all Doom, sometimes this bottomless abyss of music can be too much for some people. And there's your one flaw: This is Funeral Doom, and not everyone likes it. It's possibly the most difficult genre to listen to in all of music, and it definitly is not for everyone. The stagnant, 40 Beat Per Minute pace of some seemingly endless songs can be a huge turn off for people. The shortest song (excluding the intro) is 10 minutes 44 seconds long, and that can be overwhelming. Some don't like the low roars of Doom, and even though there are some spoken words on this CD, there are no real cleans. Some people just don't like Doom at all, and if you are one of those people, then just don't get this CD.

If Funeral Doom is your thing, then please, stop reading this review and go get Antithesis of Light. Go. Now. There's nothing I haven't already explained about this CD that I feel the need to say. I never knew that despair could be so beautiful, but Evoken proves that and much more. I've run out of things to say, but just in case I haven't gotten my point across, I'll leave you with a quote from a Metal Archives review of this very same CD.

"This will obliterate your poop-chute."

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