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Rating: "My Dying Bride": never has a name been so morbidly fitting for an extreme band. Born, or better yet Dead considering the musical genre they propose, in 1990 in the north of England, they immediately stood out for their atypical Death Metal. Long compositions saturated with arcane, otherworldly, gothic atmospheres, with such a heavy Doom imprint that it brings them closer to key groups of the genre like Black Sabbath and Candlemass. Adding to that is a growl voice so lugubrious as I have rarely heard before.
And after twenty-five years of career, they released their thirteenth full-length work this year, "Feel The Misery" is its title, confirming once again as a truly unique band that has very rarely made a misstep in their discography. But today I want to focus on a compilation, released in the year 2000 for "Peaceville Records" (another formidable label on par with the more renowned "Earache" and "Nuclear Blast"), which explored the first part of the English band's career. For me, the best period of My Dying Bride.
It's the nine minutes of the sluggish "Symphonaire Infernus Et Spera Empyrium" that open the album: just a few seconds and the thick, dark voice of Aaron enters the track. You are catapulted to Hell directly through the main gate; the two guitars weave suffocating and slow textures, with a series of riffs heavier than any measure. This is how the track proceeds for the first five minutes, until an almost unexpected swerve with a brutal and dramatic acceleration, entering Death Metal territories. A song taken from one of their primordial demos: in fact, the recording level is nothing short of indecent, but it works very well like that.
From a sound quality perspective, things improve, and by a lot, already with the second track "The Crown Of Sympathy" taken from that Gothic-Doom masterpiece that was their second album "Turn Loose The Swans". This time the minutes are twelve, and we are faced with a much more considered sonic assault, but no less raw and ruthless for that. The voice has also become clearer and is supported, in addition to the impeccable work of the two guitars, by the icy sound of a violin. A long journey into the darkness, with some moments of such slowness that it's hard to withstand: in a nutshell, one of their best pieces.
With "The Grief Of Age," you plunge back into the sick atmosphere of the first demo: only four minutes are in this track. A violent slap in the face, savage fury in its chaotic pacing: a Death ride that annihilates and destroys everything. Frightening. Finally, you can breathe because in the second part of the compilation, the atmospheres become less dark. And it is good and right to point out at this point a track like "For You"; a long auditory marvel, with atmospheres that have become much more rarefied, expansive. A clean voice, that less oppressive violin sound supporting the graceful and at times dreamy embroidery of the guitars.
These are My Dying Bride, a truly unique band in the Metal field; I often return to the deathbed of the dying bride, having their extensive discography. Do so too, with due caution given the majesty of their sound.
Tracklist and Lyrics
01 Symphonaire Infernus Et Spera Empyrium (08:55)
The destroying genius of idols
Will shroud the world with utter lies
Dance the cobbles, his abode named Dis
Portraits have spoken their masters distress
Icons with kisses, tell me who have seen this
Failing Enochian tapestries
Depict the prince of fallen virtues
In almost poetic rhapsody
Masterbate to the sound of the knell
The Patchetic stench of dying children
Perhaps our fall is certain
Limbs entwined in absolute contoursion
Please put off your veil
Your heart is blameless
And I shudder for knowing it
A hot May makes a fat churchyard
And Lychfowel breed in chaotic frenzy
Her cry was the saddest of all earths sounds
Trauma bites hard the hearts of Kin
Swept away by a moments sadness
They say rage is a brief madness
By way of the beloveds farewell
Give back to nature what we first did take
And monuments would slowly fill
The agendas' of Kings and Queens
In silence our faces bleed
The holy voice torn away by the gale
Make yourself all honey and the flies will devour you
Love is a game where both players cheat
Gone is the tale of Hero and Leander
Women are angels yet wedlock's the devil
To have and to hold but death no longer parts
Harlots and sluts, whores of our world
Expose their stinking vaginas'
Many who have no will of their own
Hold their souls towards the sinister bloom
Are you rich oh lord of vanity
As you peddle your wears of cruelty
Dressed up so you look the part
So blind, it's ignorance you wear
Quite brutal beyond belief
Sores that weep their septic tears
Dragged out through war torn lifetimes
And death shall feast on us all
The mills of God grind slowly
The adorable light of that which is most divine
The fascination of her shape
With mansions of awe and splendour
Elegant in simplicity
So at last your faith rewards you
Through fields enriched with pastel shade
And fragrant lavenders soft to smell
You laugh and drink wine of no great age
Nature does scent the farthest shores
Face to face your angelic host
All hopes in you imperishably kept
Is God your wish and all your dreams
If your body is frail then yes by all means
Make yourself all honey and the flies will devour you
02 The Crown Of Sympathy (12:11)
See the light and feel my warm desire, run through my veins like the evening sun.
It will live but no eyes will see it.
I'll bless your name before I die.
No person in everything can shine, yet shine you did, for the world to see.
All a man hath will he give for life?
For life that's lost bleeds all over me.
I'd fallen before but it never hurt like this.
Don't leave me here to crawl through the mire.
I'm without fault before the throne of god.
Take from me the crown of sympathy.
What do you think you'll see?
What do you think there will be?
Sit down!
Did you see the sun?
What will we become?
Great ones?
The mouths that dare not speak his name, behold them, raised, complete and fine.
The battle for our lives is oh, so brief.
Take my hand and please walk with me.
When I was young the sun did burn my face.
I let its love and warmth wash over me.
The melting voice of many, in the hush of night.
Whispering tongues can poison my honest truth.
Come dress me with your body, and comfort me.
I dreamt of a dead child in my sleep.
I wear a terrible mark in my head.
My clean, white bed.
It calls to me.
I must lie down.
And I want you to lay with me, in sympathy.
No sad "adieus" on a balcony.
For one last time, just walk with me.
At the beautiful gate of the temple, we must be saved.
For deadened, icy pain, covers all the earth.
09 The Cry Of Mankind (04:36)
You can't expect to see him and survive
You'll swallow his tongue of thorns
His mouth, dripping with flies
In his glorious kingdom of fire
But I believe he wept
I will make them all lie down
Down where hope lies dying
With lust, you're kicking mankind to death
We live and die without hope
You tramp us down in a river of death
As I stand here now, my heart is black
I don't want to die a lonely man
This is a weary hour
This is a weary hour
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