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Throes Of Dawn: The great fleet of echoes
07/04/10 || Altmer
Sucking is prohibited here at GD. We always strive to make people make the best music possible. That is why you get told when you are a terrible band – you are a terrible band, so spare the world your music, or make better music (and we have better suggestions than you do, trust me). Throes of Dawn doesn’t suck, but as far as I know, they aren’t the best thing since sliced bread either. And it isn’t what they play, but how they play it, that makes it a pain to sit through their album in full.
They do have a few good things going for them, though. The opening song opens with two minutes of classic Pink Floydian atmosphere, which automatically gets them into my good books. The rest of the song reminds me slightly of mid-era Anathema, which is always good, but there’s a more gothic tinge to it – there are more prominent keys and string synths, which make it sound like what Anathema would be if they were crossed with My Dying Bride, and substantially less metal. In fact, most of the time, this is barely metal at all, apart from a bunch of distorted guitar riffs. I have a faint idea these guys sound Finnish (and while googling, I found out that they actually ARE Finnish, what a surprise), because they also remind me of Sentenced somewhere a bit (but latter day Sentenced, not the death metal incarnation of that band). The vocals are mostly clean, but a few ok-ish growls pop up here and there. So sound-wise, there is a definite appeal, especially if you like your music more down-tempo and moody.
The big issue with these guys, though, is that their music is boring as hell. Doomy, melodic stuff is all fine with me, but you really have to write strong songs to engage the listener. And they don’t have that. To give an example from a similar band: Anathema wrote “Fragile dreams”. These guys don’t have a song like that. They can play all the good types of music they want, but only if there are more songs on here like “Velvet chokehold” will they ever succeed at that. There’s not much that is actually interesting more than it is passable, which is a pity since these guys can play.
The last major drawback is the guitar tone, which is weak as all fuck, and doesn’t lend the songs strength at all. The guitars sound as if their presence is oddly low in the mix, in favour of strings, keys, and electronics, which is clearly the wrong choice, because although melody is important to emphasize, it leaves the songs without the oomph to draw in the listener, making a full listen a deep dark trudge rather than a walk in the park. A walk in a dark, doomy, empty park at night. With wolves howling. And then in the throes of dawn, you get eaten by a great fleet of echoes. I hope that isn’t what these fucks are sad about, though, but yeah… isn’t doom supposed to sound oppressive, rather than quasi-moody? The weak production makes it sound like their weeping is a girl on her period, as opposed to a girl with 10 stillborn babies and a husband stabbed in the face a million times by a sneaky lizard with blooded teeth, and his crony clown with a bob-hat, ice cream, and a face like the Joker on acid.
Sometimes, interesting stylistic experiments pop up, like on the fourth track, which sounds exactly like “Wildhoney”-era Tiamat, but with an almost Syd Barrett-esque flourish to the vocals. But even though that, too, is solid like a rock, it isn’t enough to elevate this album above more than passable. If you have gothic/doom branded on your forearms, indulge, but otherwise, you should do Anathema, Tiamat, or My Dying Bride, or Paradise Lost, or… well, you get the drill by now, don’t you? This isn’t interesting enough to be of any lasting consequence.
(P.S. On the band’s MySpace, they are listed as death metal. Don’t be fooled, this isn’t even close to death metal, no matter whether they have growls).
- Information
- Released: 2010
- Label: Firebox Records
- Website: Throes Of Dawn MySpace
- Band
- Henri Koivula: vocals
- Juha Ylikoski: guitars
- Jani Heinola: synth, guitars
- Harri Hurtala: bass
- Jani Martikkala: drums
- Tracklist
- 01. Entropy
- 02. Ignition of the Grey Sky
- 03. Velvet Chokehold
- 04. Soft Whispers of the Chemical Sun
- 05. Chloroform
- 06. Slow Motion
- 07. We Have Ways to Hurt You
- 08. Lethe
- 09. The Great Fleet of Echoes
- 10. Blue Dead Skies
