Rapture
Futile

I Rapture is a band that I discovered a few years ago, during an exploration of the most diverse subgenres of heavy metal.

A Helsinki-based entity (Finland), Rapture released their debut album in 1999. A ray of light inside a dark room: this is what is portrayed on the cover artwork of "Futile". The main themes around which the album revolves are indeed isolation and the eternal contrast between light/darkness.

The genre played by the Finns is a melodic death doom metal infused with gothic and dark atmospheres. The album is structured with a mid-length "Intro" and seven great tracks, ranging from five to eight minutes: they convey a strong sense of melancholy, highlighted by a frequent alternation between acoustic parts, often accompanied by clean vocals, and typical metallic passages characteristic of the genre, combined with a distinct pursuit of majestic sounds.

"Futile", musically speaking, meets all the requirements of doom metal, proving to be a well-crafted album overall, free from purely filler episodes and, just as one would expect from a respectable Finnish band, capable of evoking a cold and decadent atmosphere to the listener.

The pleasant "Intro" sets the stage for the excellent "To Forget", forged around an elegant metallic arpeggio able to captivate the listener, subsequently plunging them into an abyss as black as pitch, within which what remains of the light is only a glimmer.

Immediately following is the track "This Is Where I Am", marked by a fast-paced rhythmic structure, where the feelings of anger and sorrow are felt with a certain intensity.

"The Fall" and the "title track" are two episodes located in the middle section of the album, easily recognizable due to a rather solemn attitude that visits the standard features of melodic death doom metal.

Another technique that Rapture's repertoire is equipped with is the use of whispered vocals, a quality that reaches its peak on "While The World Sleeps", a track whose style vaguely recalls Opeth's masterpiece "My Arms, Your Hearse". This is not surprising, considering that both albums are from 1999.

"Futile" closes with two stunning power ballads that, upon reading the tracklist, immediately catch the eye due to their rather evocative titles, with words enclosed in parentheses, "Someone I (Don't) Know" and "(About) Leaving", contrasting each other: the first is introduced by a fabulous acoustic passage, which consequently leads to a refined barrier of metallic sounds; the second, on the other hand, opens aggressively, giving rise, during the album's final three minutes, to the highest peak ever reached by the latter, namely a wall of sound with crystalline class aiming to literally pierce the listener's heart as only an ice arrow could. It is mainly thanks to these last two tracks that the band manages to highlight remarkable originality in terms of composition, songwriting, and melodic variations.

"Futile", in stark contrast with the meaning of the term, is a gem that cannot at all be out of place within any collection of doom metal records and related genres. If you appreciate bands of the caliber of Katatonia's "Brave Murder Day" and October Tide's "Rain Without End", this album will surely not disappoint you.