Author: Caspian
Heathenharvest.com
Death/ Doom's general history through it's 19 or so years of existence is a somewhat strange one. Whereas thrash, death, black, doom etc etc. got progressively more extreme as bands fought over who could go the fastest, who could fit the most riffs in, who could down tune the most etc. death/doom started off as this brutal, utterly inaccessible genre (Flower Withers, Transcendence, Eternal Darkness, Into the Autumn Shade etc etc) and then preceded to water itself down to hell over time. Whereas those albums explored the very depths of, y'know, torment and stuff, November's Doom sort of remind me of Opeth, but a slightly more generic version of them.
Well, they're not an exact ringer of Opeth; as much as I dislike that band at least they tried something different with their whole "throw in random acoustic sections" schtick. November's Doom aren't really into doing anything new; why do that when this sort of stuff gets so well received? Essentially, this is a bland and incredibly boring mix of sort-of death metal, with a few sort of slower sections that are probably meant to be doom, but come out more as "sad rock", often with harsh vocals.
The band sort of try to make things interesting; there's a few tempo changes, a bunch of clean parts scattered throughout each song, Despite that though I remained supremely uninterested throughout; the vocalist never really sounds that interested, and short of one particularly vicious bit of drums/guitar interplay (2nd verse in "The Harlot's Lie", really does it for me for some reason) nothing really gets me nodding my head, let alone banging it.
Perhaps the main problem is that the band seem to be stuck in a stylistic rut. There's that cool little strange time sig jazz/ prog bit in "The Fifth Day of March" (a really effective ballad that's probably the best song here) but for the most part things follow a very repetitive formula- with the additional problem being that the template they're working with isn't that great in the first place. It sounds like these guys know it, too; they all sound heartily sick of the music they're playing. The guitars just never grab your attention, going from one boring Opeth styled riff to another, with the occaisonal and similarly boring slower part and clean (again, a heavy Opeth influence, along with perhaps some old prog) section, and the vocalist... Well, he's not awful; it's just that he never sounds all that interested. He's trying to sing in too deep a register, for one; and while perhaps he sounds a bit manlier he isn't really able to put much force in it as he would if he went a bit higher and got his wailing on. Likewise, his attempts at death vocals fall flat, although to be fair they're difficult to pull off when they're over riffing that's as flat and boring as it is on here.
I guess I should add that this band is hardly actively terrible. They're all competent musicians, the production's good, the lyrics aren't cringeworthy. However, they lack any sort of spark; there's no motivation, no drive, and most importantly, nothing that really connects with the listener. All a load of fluff, really.
Heathenharvest.com
Death/ Doom's general history through it's 19 or so years of existence is a somewhat strange one. Whereas thrash, death, black, doom etc etc. got progressively more extreme as bands fought over who could go the fastest, who could fit the most riffs in, who could down tune the most etc. death/doom started off as this brutal, utterly inaccessible genre (Flower Withers, Transcendence, Eternal Darkness, Into the Autumn Shade etc etc) and then preceded to water itself down to hell over time. Whereas those albums explored the very depths of, y'know, torment and stuff, November's Doom sort of remind me of Opeth, but a slightly more generic version of them.
Well, they're not an exact ringer of Opeth; as much as I dislike that band at least they tried something different with their whole "throw in random acoustic sections" schtick. November's Doom aren't really into doing anything new; why do that when this sort of stuff gets so well received? Essentially, this is a bland and incredibly boring mix of sort-of death metal, with a few sort of slower sections that are probably meant to be doom, but come out more as "sad rock", often with harsh vocals.
The band sort of try to make things interesting; there's a few tempo changes, a bunch of clean parts scattered throughout each song, Despite that though I remained supremely uninterested throughout; the vocalist never really sounds that interested, and short of one particularly vicious bit of drums/guitar interplay (2nd verse in "The Harlot's Lie", really does it for me for some reason) nothing really gets me nodding my head, let alone banging it.
Perhaps the main problem is that the band seem to be stuck in a stylistic rut. There's that cool little strange time sig jazz/ prog bit in "The Fifth Day of March" (a really effective ballad that's probably the best song here) but for the most part things follow a very repetitive formula- with the additional problem being that the template they're working with isn't that great in the first place. It sounds like these guys know it, too; they all sound heartily sick of the music they're playing. The guitars just never grab your attention, going from one boring Opeth styled riff to another, with the occaisonal and similarly boring slower part and clean (again, a heavy Opeth influence, along with perhaps some old prog) section, and the vocalist... Well, he's not awful; it's just that he never sounds all that interested. He's trying to sing in too deep a register, for one; and while perhaps he sounds a bit manlier he isn't really able to put much force in it as he would if he went a bit higher and got his wailing on. Likewise, his attempts at death vocals fall flat, although to be fair they're difficult to pull off when they're over riffing that's as flat and boring as it is on here.
I guess I should add that this band is hardly actively terrible. They're all competent musicians, the production's good, the lyrics aren't cringeworthy. However, they lack any sort of spark; there's no motivation, no drive, and most importantly, nothing that really connects with the listener. All a load of fluff, really.
