Review Summary: Cult of Luna take some small steps forward while delving into the thoughts of a madman.
Fans of Cult of Luna looking for something completely new or ground breaking should probably stop reading here. This album is a band doing what they do best, making solid songs.
After 2006’s Somewhere Along the Highway it could be said Cult of Luna (CoL) was searching for, reaffirming and experimenting with their sound. While The Beyond and the S/T albums were droning sludge fests; Salvation and SATH were tempered with quiet ambient passages and soft interludes woven in between slabs of crushing riffs. Eternal Kingdom more or less combines the feel of the latter two albums while still sounding like they’re not rewriting the same songs. Not necessarily moving forward but sitting comfortably and experimenting in a reduced capacity.
Remember those 10+ minute journeys that CoL used to take you on? Well for the most part those are gone, with the exception of
Ghost Trail. Instead of crafting sprawling landscapes of sound they have chosen to tighten and focus their aural assaults, similar to what Pelican tried but with better results. Part of Pelican’s appeal was that it took so long and many different directions to get to the destination. CoL never needed overtly long songs per se but it did give them plenty of time to create smothering blankets of atmosphere which is something very few can match what they are capable of. That’s not to say the songs aren’t still lengthy, the average tracks clocks in at about 6 minutes, which is more than enough time to get their ideas out. Eternal Kingdom incorporates the somewhat more organic feeling guitar work of SATH and the electronic elements of Salvation while adding a few new touches like horns and an expansion of effects likely from synths.
Owlwood opens things nicely reminding listeners that CoL haven’t forgotten their heavy roots while still showing flourishes of well placed melodies and softer sections. The instrumental tracks are nicely done but I can’t say I enjoyed them as much as before when compared to mostly instrumental songs like
Dim or
Dark City, Dead Man.
Ug*n and
Österbotten aren’t bad but just don’t catch my attention in the same way as earlier efforts. I think if they could have fleshed them out like they would have before they could have been amazing tracks.
The Lure, which is lightly induced by horns, mainly serves as respite from the colossal ending of
Ghost Trail, which is easily the best song on the album.
Ghost Trail is a beautifully crafted slow burner, taking its sweet time sucking you into its dazzling, gaping jaws before regurgitating you back out. As previously mentioned the ending is just a monster, slowing to a crawl before continually speeding up the tempo and intensity while Klas screams his lungs out.
The clean vocals have all been abandoned leaving Klas to give his brand of tortured screaming. The lyrics were derived from the diary, “Tales from the Eternal Kingdom”, of an inmate named Holger Nilsson at a former insane asylum which now serves as the band’s rehearsal space. The concept follows the imaginary world Nilsson built to explain the murder of his wife, involving bizarre half human/half animal characters, and ultimately blaming the death on someone else.* It’s basically a twisted fantasy story but the lyrics that were taken are vague enough to leave up to interpretation.
The guitar work isn’t overly complex though the melodic parts are very well composed and always fit the surrounding instrumentation. This shouldn’t surprise anyone who knows CoL or many post metal bands as it’s always been more about the overall feel than showboating or individualism. The drums seemed to be mixed a bit more clearly than before while retaining the power they should possess, plenty of fills and patterns to keep things interesting. Pleasantly the bass doesn’t always track the guitars and adds its own variations to what’s going on.
Following Betulas closes the album keeping the fury contained to a kind of controlled medium. This is mainly due to the guitars having a light distortion and not a metallic crunch which likely would have been present on earlier releases. The skins are excellent and guide the other instruments creating a crashing wall of sound. This is also one of the songs that applies trumpets to the chaos and brings everything to a triumphant closing. If you’re still left wondering what a Betula is, simply put it’s a type of birch tree. Although in this case it’s tree-men, “The white birches are alive, they are marching.”
So while Isis have experimented with a more tribal and mythical approach and Neurosis have gone back to the heaviness that they started with; CoL is comfortable exploring their sound and attempting to expand upon it. From the direction the album takes CoL seem to really want to invoke the madness that Holger Nilsson obviously contained. The middle songs lose some of the focus but the rest are more than enough to make up for the stumble. Although it’s nothing incredibly new it is a solid release from one of the best bands of the post metal genre.
*Sentence taken from Earache’s site
