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Rating:
Listening to this EP and their career's final episode means listening to two records that are light-years apart from each other. And although this might be more than legitimate when many years pass from the beginning to the end of a career, it doesn't seem so logical knowing that their contribution to the metal scene lasted just 4 years.
Those who only know the most famous chapters of their discography won't find in this EP what characterized their success, but something entirely different. I believe you will find yourselves completely bewildered just as I did when I got to know them by starting to listen to (by sheer coincidence) their last album, and then went backwards through the years, discovering this "Gardens Of Grief," the band's historic debut.
An unsettling album starting with the cover, which already hints at the atmosphere pervading the songs (look at it carefully, it certainly doesn't exude brightness). In fact, the musical grooves follow one another slow and heavy, lacking the fast outbursts that will later become their trademark in the years to come. The typical characteristics of dark Scandinavian death are more than evident, forming a rich sonic weave less spartan than that of their overseas cousins, who were conceiving something entirely different during the same years.
Today, it's easy to say these things, but who knows what impressions the "freshness" contained in these compositions aroused back then, and which audience segment (albeit narrow, because we true metallers are aware) it impacted. In short, unsettling sounds, where we find a deep voice that occasionally transforms into insane and sick screaming.
This record represents an important debut in the metal scene, as At The Gates were among the very first pioneers of the "made in Sweden" genre to which they later contributed melody and a certain taste for arrangement, which as you might have realized is almost completely missing here.
There is little else to add about this work based on 4 songs, which however do not flow at all easily: the sounds are among the heaviest I have ever encountered in music and (with considerable effort) one barely glimpses a melodic glimmer. "Slaughter Of The Soul" is still very, very far away. Dedicated only to collectors and those who love the darker sounds of the early '90s, which gave birth to everything we today universally know as Swedish death metal.
Tracklist and Lyrics
02 At the Gates (05:22)
It is cold out here
and lonely is my journey
I walk the trail of broken souls
the darkest path through infinity
far behind my body rot
for me no more tomorrow
fear or pain I know not
and yet I am filled with sorrow
I am at the gates
Lord of chaos
let me sleep
space is deep
Lord of chaos...
through the gates the journey goes on
the fate of my immortal soul
through the gates the journey goes on and on...
All I crave is to sleep
All I crave is to sleep
Across the seas without no name
the weak spot of the creation
My crown of thorns all life it drains
as the sears back of my mind
but at the side of my lake
insanity wait for me to find
I am all as I am you and me
I am everything and will forever be
a part of your throughout eternity
when you die you too will be
heaven waits below as you will see
I am at the the gates but where are the keys
all I crave is to sleep
all I crave is to sleep
lord of chaos...
03 All Life Ends (06:10)
My life fades, my visions dim
all that remains are memories
I remember a time of chaos
time of war
as men began to feed on man
only the scavengers survived
gone now, swept away
for reasons long forgotten
touched of a blase
which engulfed them all
a firestorm of fear
the answer is written in their bones
all life ends
I remember an old man
griping my wrist, he was dying
"imagine", he said
"looking into the eyes of a nova,
the bursting flames, the roar of it's energy
frintly echoing down the corridors of time,
whispering: all life ends
"death, he said "is like a bolt of lightning,
Light cast upon every secret,
just for a moment, till the last spark of life fades
and all is dark..."
then he breathed out his last breath into my ear
his gaze already way out among the stars...
among the ruins of the past
I shelter from the storm
my mind is numb from the lonliness
and the rain that never stops
this wasteland, once a beautiful place
where trees and flowers grew
where deer, and squirells had their home
now rotting are their bones
Where raging waters grind the earth
I go to end my days
the sea that witnessed mankinds birth
shall watch us die again
black and deep,
empty of life
as in the heaven so below
the sun has now forever set
and bids our time to go
I am tired
and I fear not
the cold that now descends
as light grows dim, I bid farewell
all life ends
I am leaving now, my body stiff
just watching for a while
that rigid shell, so small and weak
a corpse on a broken cliff
the stars are calling me now
with distant, speechless voices
and caught by a wind I drift away
and nothing calls me to stay...
I am ridint the wind that has no name,
the fire that burns without a flame
caught by the spell on which all depends,
all life ends
the answer is written in my bones,
all life ends
04 City of Screaming Statues (04:46)
City of screaming statues
Your soul will grow to understand and respect this place
It will be with your in your heart, on your journey
The gates of city lies before you
The temple of truth whispering their waves
Chase your visions, slay your fears
What moves the truth is the sound of your thoughts
Scream
The struggle of the soul
Depends on the strength of your will
Among the twisted shapes of your madness
You will find your light and your genius
In the city where the statues they scream
For their truth to be real
The dreams and the visions
The reality and the light
Within the soul of the city
May be whatever you wish it to be
In the city where the statues they scream
For their truth to be real
Stand up and turn your back on reality
Lie down and let your dreams attack
The silence of a soul that is true
Is the silence that you lack
Feel the strength pulsating through you
As the gates they close behind you
The answers lie within the city
Within the light
In the sunrise of your soul, time is the key
The music of the truth, now behold
Rise and crush them
The gates of city lies before you
The temple of truth whispering their waves
Chase your visions, slay your fears
What moves the truth is the sound of your thoughts
The statues they scream
For their truth to be real
Within the walls of the city
Where death aint the end
The music of the truth, the light of the end
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