Drawn by the magnificent cover, I approached this album, released in 2003, by Autumn Rain Melancholy, a Russian band active since 2000. And I got lost in a yellowed and bare forest on a sad rainy day... and the sensation was exhilarating.
With the opener "Nachalo", sung in the native language like the entire album, our walk in the woods begins, as clouds obscure the faint light of the evening and the air becomes dense and cold. Stunning is the progression of piano and drums accompanying the sweet voice of the singer in the second track: "Slezy Oseny" which ends overwhelmed by a light rain.
"Sneg" is the first song where the male voice appears. With the opener "Nachalo", sung in the native language like the entire album, our walk in the woods begins as clouds obscure the faint light of the evening and the air becomes dense and cold. The intro of the fourth track (untitled) is beautiful, where the guitars become heavier and faint violins lead to the album's first tempo acceleration.
The vocal eclecticism proposed by the quintet stands out, alternating guttural vocalizations as mentioned before to pure "lyricism", as proven by "Pred Stupenjamy Beskonechnosty" or "Okonchaine (Moy Mir)" which offers a duet between two very distant vocal styles, at times reminiscent of the early Theatre Of Tragedy, also due to the beautiful female voice.
The overlap of instruments such as the organ, clarinet, and the aforementioned piano with more 'heavy' sounds is fascinating, and the result is a captivating gothic/doom, demonstrated by the instrumental "Kogda Angely Umiraut", never banal.
The longest song "I Mne Hochetsja Verit" is the most violent and becomes almost unsettling at the end with the piano overpowering everything else, while the final "Posle", a soft and gentle velvet of keyboard tones, leaves us immersed in a paradisiacal sad sweetness.
Honestly, I did not expect to come across such a well-produced and arranged album, besides being (and above all) masterfully played. For lovers of gothic and melancholic sounds (and for those who want to discover a new very capable band), "Seven Steps To Infinity" is an album that must be listened to.
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