Decemberance – Inside

posted by Zamo on September 26, 2010

Decemberance – Inside

Genre: Death/doom metal

Country: Greece

Label: I for an I





As long as Greek metal bands are concerned, the first names that pop into my mind would be Rotting Christ, Septic Flesh, Nightfall, Ravencult or Suicidal Angels.. It was quite hard to associate Greece with a death/doom metal band. I was proved wrong.

Decemberance was formed in September 1997. With some changes from the original line-up, the first demo “Decemberance” came out in January 1998, obtaining good reviews from the relevant Greek press. Their first full-length, “Inside”, was released during the end of 2009. In July 2010 the album was re-released, world wide this time ( Germany, Austria, Belgium,Bulgaria, Canada, Estonia, France, Italy, Japan, Luxemburg, Mexico, Holland, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Slovakia, Switzerland and U.S.A) through Twilight Vertrieb.

“Inside” isn’t an ordinary death/doom album and surely, you can’t just say “Oh, right.. I’ve heard this way too many times already”. Of course, like any band, Decembrance as well let themselves influenced by other bands or genres, but, for sure, this fact contributed to the unique in their tracks.. It offered them originality.

“Time” is the track that prepares you for the whole album; A track that makes you understand the upcoming content in subtle manners. “Inside” is an album in which we encounter classical doom metal passages, with low riffs and heavy growls, special effects accompanied by a subtle organ, and all these elements confer a cryptic and gloomy sensation. If we only look at these aspects, we can say that it’s a typical death/doom album, but at this point, those influence i mentioned above interfere. Transitions between that classical death/doom, to rough death metal passages, even several psychedelic and progressive moments. Surprising are, as well, the moments in which violin, semi acoustic guitar, or piano passages appear. Even though there are so many different moments that you have to pay attention to, the album is well composed, it seems knotted and goes on with its concept until the very end.

Maybe the only bad side of these influences, dipped in so many genres would be that it splits the doom metal listeners in two, somewhat, it depends on you, whether you accept a trace of new in a doom metal album or not.

It may fulfill the likes of the people that accept a more complex approach of the tracks, that don’t really look for a stereotypical sort of doom metal and are waiting for something new and surprising with every single song or it may make the classical death/doom metal followers have impose several objection (such as.. the tracks should be a bit shorter and the death metal areas a bit less frequent.. or maybe it should focus more on a single genre).

Nonetheless, as an ending, the album deserves to be listened to by every single fan of the genre, you will certainly encounter moments in which you will be pleasantly surprised and will tell yourself.. ” I didn’t expect that “. Also, only this way you will be able to form an objective personal approach over the album named ” Inside “.

Tracks that went to my heart: Time, Rain, Sunset.

Until then, you can find something about them on their myspace page as well:
http://www.myspace.com/decembrance

Rating:
7.5/10