Evoken
Antithesis of Light

This review adheres to the campaign against the discrimination of metal reviews and for equal opportunities.

That said, I warn the Great Masonry of the Thrashers who, on this honorable site, have launched the intolerable trend of discrediting metal records and reviews to praise insipid and anonymous crap.

I wonder, for example, if all the know-it-alls who infest almost all metal reviews with silly comments actually know the albums discussed and vote with critical awareness.
Most probably not!
And I further wonder if the same thing happens when the same know-it-alls grovel when it's time to lavish praise on reviews of more niche genres, such as indie, psychedelia, ambient (brrrr), or lo-fi, which the more lo-fi they are, the more copious the gushing will be.
Absolutely yes!

The ignorance of a broccoli is present in both cases, but the judgment will be diametrically opposite. You will agree that there is an enormous and unjust difference in evaluation.

This is where the charm of elitism comes into play. It's tremendously cool to exalt a "loser" album even if you have no idea what it sounds like.
In such circumstances, the pretentious commentator of my castanets seizes the opportunity to give himself a tone by dispensing Hosannas and blessings to the author of the review and his seventh generation; immensely grateful for having revealed a masterpiece (almost always an immense and minimal terrible crap) by sheer coincidence immensely underrated, rejoicing in the arrival of the reviewer to remedy this unacceptable injustice.
Other typical characteristics of the "rediscovered pearl" are: record too avant-garde, with contemporaries unprepared to understand its historical significance, and artist who, if in the meantime hasn't become a myth due to death from liver cirrhosis, now perhaps does (thank God) something completely different as a profession.

Let's be clear! With other terms, we see these delusions also on the other metal side, but against all democratic principles, with the same level of exaltation, the studded reviewer is ridiculed down to the bone, while the reviewer of the alternative record is a new prophet.

Well! If listening to alternative records is now the only recipe to reach the nirvana of "coolness," be informed that in the caravanserai of the numerous sub-genres and derivatives of METAL, there are plenty of elite and loser works that nobody cares about.

This little album by Evoken, with a 2005 work titled Antithesis of Light, is a perfect example of an alternative Metal album with substantial doom/ambient influences.

The aforementioned ambient enjoys high prestige among the clouded minds of cacophony enthusiasts, so it's already a guarantee of "coolness."
Doom, on the other hand, is the misanthropic cousin of psychedelia but without the snooty attitude; even more elongated times, comatose rhythm from one beat per minute leaving the drummer's tank top always fresh and fragrant; leaden and oppressive atmospheres. It's the only metal genre where sloths can do headbanging with ease.

Well, from the union of these two refined palates genres comes an album with enormous "elitist" potential and therefore with sales projections equal to 0.
Forget all the immediacy of Metal, forget its vehemence and catchiness, forget using your ears; this album more than listened to must be perceived through sensations, smells, empathy...
Seven long tracks for a total of 70 minutes (a nice little Cheops pyramid brick) project us into an obscure, cold, fetid place forgotten by men and God; no, you're not inside a voting booth, it's just that sound taking over your soul and shaking it
like a rag to squeeze out every breath of life and annihilate every glimmer of hope.

Imagine the sensations that a weekend speleologist might feel, on his first deep mine excursion at a thousand meters down, inside a stalled elevator, discovering he's claustrophobic. That's it! This is the level of anxiety that this cheerful little album inflicts.

Chamber music...funeral chamber? From lazaretto or perhaps more from a mass grave rave as well evidenced on the cover?
Undoubtedly music that at the end of the album (if you get there) will make you exclaim....
"WHO THE HELL MAKES ME LISTEN TO THIS STUFF"?
Everything in life must be earned with blood and sweat. To become cool without abandoning the mainstream Metal path, you must martyr yourself to Evoken!

STAY POWER AND ALSO STAY REALLY COOL