Review Summary: Spiritual death in the Falls of Rauros.
You know, there are days that death doesn’t sound that bad of a deal to me. Pardon my rather nihilistic statement here, but think about this for a second: No more rent, no more going to work or unemployment, no more family reunions, and more importantly a guaranteed eternal sleep on a cozy grave with absolutely no one bothering you, ever. The worms eating your corpse might be a problem but not for you, because your consciousness is going to be floating on the astral plane, bodiless and carefree! Obviously, this is all just speculation on my part because no one has come back to certify that the afterlife doesn’t suck, so let’s just put a veil on this and pretend I didn’t say anything. Please, stay with us.
Because you know what would suck about dying too? Not being able to hear the side project of Falls of Rauros’ Aaron Williams and Ray Capizzo! Rhun (wrote with a little hat on top of the “u” and not included here to preserve the extremely fragile fabric of our beloved website) is a project that’s been brewing on the pot for some three years now. Once forgotten and now refurbished,
Conveyance In Death is Williams and Capizzo shooting for something rather different from the atmo-folky black metal of Falls of Rauros while adventuring into the entangled noodling world of psychedelic black metal with a death metal aesthetic. Truth be told, I had no idea who was behind the name of Rhun until after I heard the album, and once I knew, it all somehow made sense.
Forget about the folk though, you won’t find respite on this record unless the bone-chilling cold of a millennium old cavern where ancestral souls dwell is a concept that brings you some sort of solace. It does to me though; hence I found this album to be incredibly appealing at first, rewarding all the while and permanently lingering on my mind after I heard it for the first time. No folk doesn’t mean no melody either. Williams manages to weave beautiful and epic passages of triumphant melody into the fierce tapestry of riffs that form the body and soul of
Conveyance in Death, sometimes with a single sliding note like in “Howl of Gleaming Swords”, sometimes with a full-frontal assault on the senses like the whole of “Morningstar”. Capizzo’s drumming complements the robust nature of the album, without doing anything exceptionally complicated, his blast beats feel seamlessly incorporated into the songs, carrying them like a wind of miasma after a glorious battle.
Conveyance In Death is one of those albums that came from nowhere and that honestly, it has no right to be as good as it is, but considering the pedigree of the minds behind the project, it’s also no surprise that the result of such a radical departure from their usual habitat has resulted in a recording that, for me, even rivals their work with Falls of Rauros, as sacrilegious as that may sound. This album does everything exceptionally well, reminiscing the fervent madness of Oranssi Pazuzu at times or even reaching down to death doom levels in songs like “Citadels in Ruin”. The album flows like a river of dead corpses down a mountain. “Morningstar” is a stunning opener, you’ll soon understand why (if you jam the album), and while the longest track is positioned in the middle, “Howl of Gleaming Swords” is so hypnotizing that it’s easy to lose track of time while the track pounds your ears with mighty resolution.
The closer is reminiscent of Falls of Rauros, or at least it comes close to be something familiar, but it feels like the band keeps pulling in the opposite direction, trying to put as much as distance as possible between the two projects, but oh you can’t escape the roots, for they run long and deep! The journey ends with the cackling sound of burning wood and an ominous current blowing in the distance, a fitting end to an album that sounds as inviting and welcoming as the idea of being a pinch of dust in some forlorn catacombs. It sounds great to me, but I have a 9 to 5 job, lots of bills to pay and a body decaying as fast as the netcode of this site, so if salvation is what you seek, you’ve come to the right album. Convey in figurative death if you must, but please, do it here, with us.
