Elysian Blaze
Cold Walls and Apparitions

A well-established reality is that of Mutatiis, the Elysian Blaze project, born in a rather unexpected land for the genre it offers. At least it has the privilege of breaking the ridiculous stereotype that depressed people only live in dilapidated castles in Nordonia, where winter lasts eleven months a year, and where flowers are born already dead, frozen by the permafrost.

Here we are in Australia. And in Australia, there is Mutatiis. And Mutatiis is depressed. Cold Walls And Apparitions was released in 2005, an album that can be classified as Funeral Doom, but as usual, labels always leave out a lot of stuff. Certainly, the opener does not take long to introduce the right atmosphere, opening with an icy melodic arpeggio, immediately whipped by the cadencing of sharp guitars until, within the obsessive and persecutory intrusion of a drum machine, a very distorted and blurred voice sets in. The next track "Funeral Possession" is perhaps the most evocative of the album, an intertwining of arpeggios and choirs to which a distant female voice is added, slowly unfolding in a growing climax of sound stratification. Perhaps a ray of light in the dusty cellar of the artwork. But it's just a moment, and already with "Sleeping With Corpses," we descend into the blackest claustrophobia, a completely instrumental track, built on heavy silences interspersed between piano notes and approaching footsteps. "The Altar Of Necromansy" and "Walking On The Winds Of Sin" display the usual heaviness of chords, dragged out interminably, where the scream becomes increasingly unhealthy. It closes with "A Colder Wall," with guitars and synthesizers. Infinitely mournful.

The listening of this album leaves multiple sensations. A profound sense of unease above all. But not only that. What remains is the grandeur and epicness of deeply evocative compositions. It then becomes a journey where darkness is not so frightening after all.