#death-doom

Evoken

Embrace the Emptiness

Swallow the Sun: Hope (2007)

More like Hope ... less.

By the time Swallow the Sun dropped this ironically named third full-length, I’d become one of their biggest supporters, raving to anyone and everyone who would listen about the Fins’ world-beating melodic death/doom stylings on 2003’s The Morning Never Came and ‘05’s Ghosts of Loss.

Both albums were released through a tiny, since shuttered independent label called Firebox Records, so it was a testament to the band’s growing notoriety (and my sanity) that they were scouted and signed by Finland’s domestic powerhouse, Spinefarm, before getting to work on this LP.

And yet, though the resources at their disposal were now greater, Swallow the Sun took no radical steps to alter their sound, only refined and enriched their songwriting arsenal with ever-darker power chords, ever-sweeter minor key melodies, ever-grander neoclassical synthesizers, and ever-creepier female vocals.

To wit: standouts like “These Hours of Despair,” “No Light, No Hope” and “Doomed to Walk the Earth” never sat still on a single riff or rhythm, but meticulously orchestrated their light and dark shadings, blistering and deliberate tempos, plus all of those ancillary ingredients, with a sophistication that belied the music’s inborn violence.

“Don't Fall Asleep (Horror, Pt. 2)” was another highlight illustrating the stark contrasts at the heart of the group’s uncanny genius, with its diametrically opposed bursts of metallic fury and peaceful passages, capped by Mikko Kotamäki’s multitude of voices, spanning the harshest growls and gentlest whispers.

And if the company you keep says anything about your standing in life, then Swallow the Sun were clearly “moving on up,” based on celebrity cameos from Katatonia legend Jonas Renkse on “The Justice of Suffering” and Amorphis’ Tomi Joutsen on bonus track “These Low Lands.”

Now, before you think me a Hope ... less sycophant, let me state for the record that this is NOT one of my favorite Swallow the Sun LPs, due to sub-stellar fare like “Hope,” “Too Cold for Tears,” “The Empty Skies,” and a generalized je ne sais quoi emotional distance from the whole package.

Nor did I really see the point of the following year’s stop-gap Plague of Butterflies EP (I probably need to revisit it), but Swallow the Sun allayed any concerns I may have had with 2009’s excellent New Moon, which, true to its title, showed a creatively refreshed sextet operating at the peak of their powers.