Review Summary: The 3rd and the Mortal's first release is an absolute classic and an unsung pioneering effort in female-fronted gothic metal.
A Retrospective of The 3rd and the Mortal, Part I: A Dream in Earlier Days
When you think of female-fronted gothic metal in the 90s, a few bands will probably immediately spring to mind. Bands like Theatre of Tragedy, Tristania, and The Gathering were highly accomplished and influential bands that brought this somewhat niche corner of metal to an impressively wide audience. By the time the turn of the millennium came around, the style was really evolving and picking up steam, with bands like After Forever (and later Epica), Nightwish, Within Temptation, and Lacuna Coil achieving incredible commercial success in Europe and around the world. But where did this specific style of gothic metal originate? Were The Gathering the first? Was it Theatre of Tragedy? Or was there something even before them that paved the way for the female voice in atmospheric, experimental metal? A moment of genesis from which those later bands grew and blossomed?
I'm not going to try to prove that The 3rd and the Mortal's 1994 debut EP,
Sorrow, was the very first example of female-fronted gothic metal on record. I don't claim to have perfect knowledge of the style's history, and with so many releases lost to time, it's hard to know who the true originators were to any degree of certainty. But I do know that
Sorrow, along with the immediately following full-length
Tears Laid in Earth, predates every other classic release in the style (that I know of) by almost a full year. And
Sorrow is not just a pioneering effort for this music, but a fully-realized one, immediately demonstrating a depth and complexity that the other bands would only achieve years later. And at the center of this inspired slab of gothic metal is one of the most beautiful songs ever written.
A bold statement, I know - but just listen to that title track. It feels like it's pulled from another time, yet also timeless. Modern but also archaic. It's a simple song of lost love that never gets old. I listen to it every autumn, and every year it feels more meaningful than the last. Vocalist Kari Rueslåtten performs effortlessly and emotively, taking a surprisingly complex melody and making it feel so simple as to be self-evident, like a song that existed in the air for thousands of years, just waiting for the right person to sing it. An acoustic ballad, almost medieval in its barrenness, only 2 minutes long, and placed at the center of a metal album that mostly sounds very distant from it, it feels as ephemeral as the dream it describes. Yet it also completes the EP, serving as its heart. As brilliant as the other three songs are, they wouldn't feel nearly as impactful without the perfect simplicity of "Sorrow" placed delicately between them.
And those other songs
are brilliant; each one is uniquely atmospheric and innovative in its own right. "Grevinnens Bønn" presents us with gorgeous dynamic contrasts and lush harmonies, holding back on introducing Rueslåtten until the track is more than halfway done. But when the texture pulls back and her voice finally does appear, it's showstopping. This song is one of the few examples of Norwegian lyrics in the band's discography, and the quality of the language is beautiful and haunting in this context, gently floating above the sea of distortion that we were drowning in just moments earlier. "Ring of Fire" is a somewhat more energetic track, but one that still showcases engaging dynamics and winding interplay between the voice and guitars. The closing track, "Silently I Surrender", is a mini-epic, featuring a deep and melodic sound interwoven with acoustic passages that recall the simple beauty of the title track.
This is where the EP ends, suddenly yet perfectly, with Rueslåtten's voice and the acoustic guitar gently dancing together into silence. In the span of only 20 minutes, The 3rd and the Mortal have crafted an entire world of emotive, atmospheric sound, possibly creating an entire subgenre of metal in the process. Yet, despite the enormous historical importance
Sorrow holds, it somehow feels small and humble, like a beautiful stone that you were just lucky enough to stumble upon. I know that's how I felt when I first discovered The 3rd and the Mortal's music almost 15 years ago. Their music would quickly start to spiral in increasingly experimental and eclectic directions, but this unassuming little metal EP from their earliest days is probably their most influential work - a work that has been mostly forgotten, but that will hopefully see more recognition as time goes on. Because it's not just any beautiful stone; it's an absolute gem.
