Review Summary: 5th Door: listening to this album.
For those unaware of the literary phrase ‘Pathetic Fallacy’, it is a term that attributes an aspect of nature with a physical human action, sensation or emotion. Essentially, it personifies an inhuman noun; crawling water, gloomy fog, ice that bites. While pathetic fallacy is traditionally applied in literacy, it also has ties to music in addition to human characteristics. Dynfari is one such band who encapsulates their environmental surroundings of their homeland, Iceland, in their music.
Dotted around its terrain are gaping fjords with smaller siblings of pools and twisting streams that energetically meander around the still green fields and during night time, the towering, dormant volcanoes stoop under the grandeur of the Aurora Borealis, dancing in the cloudless skies. Much like the landscape of this country, Dynfari’s music is similarly oxymoronic in their emotions as Iceland is in its geography. Having already demonstrated an ethereal style of black metal since 2010, over the course of three albums, this Icelandic quartet steadily moves towards conceptually based albums which help direct the music through its expressive journey.
Their fourth album,
“The Four Doors of the Mind”, explores fantasy writer Patrick Rothfuss’ theory on the mind’s ability to cope with pain through four different ways: Sleep, Forgetting, Madness and Death. The band also weaves Rothfuss’ theory with Icelandic existentialist poet, Jóhann Sigurjónsson. The introductory title track explains this profound concept through a spoken word passage; these explanations reappear throughout the album, usually at the start of a song. Even though there is always a serene, adjoining acoustic melody accompanying the spoken word passages, the explanations do disrupt the momentum due to their frequent appearance. However, this technique is, understandably, used to emphasise the meanings behind the songs and the seamless sequence of the album’s structure.
Evidently, Dynfari has made a conscious effort to evolve their traditional black metal aesthetics further than they have before, choosing to delve into post-rock territories. This expansive method is illustrated more so in the second half of the album. Jóhann Örn repeats:
‘There are times when reality is nothing but pain; to escape pain, the mind must leave reality behind’ during “3rd Door: Madness” and the music compliments this viewpoint. Regressed melodies are shrouded behind pounding drums and strong riffs, as the song finally ‘leaves reality’, timbre riffs and gentle folksy acoustics emerge with captivating results. Strengthening Dynfari’s oxymoronic tendencies further, “4th Door: Death” establishes an incredibly spacious environment where bass sways between unhurried grooves and extended harmonies that maintain the bleak, yet tranquil, illustration of dying.
Although the band’s typical black metal can be heard through waving tremolo, sinister whispers and guttural growls in “1st Door: Sleep”, the band’s tone has evolved into a more introspective, melancholic form. Roaring tremolo twists between mid-paced grooves and anthemic choirs during “Sorgarefni segi eg þér”, however, Jóhann Örn’s vocals sound gothic, and the abrasive riffs gradually contort into a hypnotic rhythm that has a soporific effect. “2nd Door: Forgetting” is an intense track but instead of relying on a thunderous tone like most black metal bands do, Dynfari establishes their intensity in softer ways such as escalating piano and spiralling melodies. Combined together, this makes for an apprehensive, fearful, traumatic atmosphere that underlines the fact that
‘some memories are too painful, and are beyond healing’ .
Not only has Dynfari embodied the vast, ever-changing landscape of their homeland in
“The Four Doors of the Mind”, they have also created an absorbing album that is pristine in its production, seamless in its cohesion and limitless in its emotional captivation.
