The Foreshadowing
Days Of Nothing

In recent years, our capital has taken an increasingly prominent place in a certain Italian musical panorama, proving to be a happy island for the birth of bands with a promising future and undeniable class. Novembre, Klimt 1918, Room With A View, En Declin, and others have managed to breathe new life into Italian metal, creating highly appreciated products even abroad.

With this premise, I am ready to accompany you in listening to Foreshadowing and their debut, "Days Of Nothing". The names that make up the Roman sextet are not new: there are indeed (former) members of groups like the aforementioned Klimt 1918, Spiritual Front, and Dope Stars Inc., all united to play what, according to them, has always been their passion: doom metal. Drawing heavily from Katatonia, My Dying Bride (during their golden lyrical period of "The Angel And The Dark River"), Anathema (also considered for the first two albums), as well as their fellow countrymen Novembre, the group delivers ten excellently crafted tracks, and despite the many influences, of remarkable quality, positioning themselves as one of the best Italian metal productions of recent years.

The doom presented on the album is slow and subdued, characterized by liquid guitar arpeggios that manage to be ethereal and sharp like a cold wind but also heavy and monolithic when needed. Complementing them is a perfect rhythm section, with drums often in the foreground, keyboard parts of notable technical stature, and vocals never in growl, sad and subdued, with a voice that is dark yet warm and fascinating (albeit sometimes a bit too linear). This results in a mood more apocalyptic than angry, melancholic and decadent but not nihilistic and destructive.

The opening "Cold Waste": a strummed beginning is followed by very slow guitar riffs, before the track takes off with a rhythmic, catchy, and elegant pace. The overall atmosphere is imbued with a desert-like melancholy, vividly outlining a landscape destroyed by some catastrophe, swept only by dusty winds and pouring rain. The references to MDB here are many, especially in Marco Benevento's singing (who tries to connect with the recitative and highly expressive style of the dying bride, yet giving his personal touch and not limiting himself to mere mannerism) and in the guitars, mournful, romantic, and clean.

"The Wandering" instead begins with "anathema-like" reflective and calm six strings, before exploding into an emotionally intense main riff, capable of winning you over with its sweetness and at the same time definitiveness. There are also some faster parts, characterized by more animated drumming and more aggressive inserts: this is the case with "Death Is Our Freedom", also greatly indebted to MDB but never excessively so, with an underlying riff that recalls certain things done in a more gothic context.

It's hard to highlight other particularly significant tracks, the subsequent seven are all noteworthy even for just one reason, a note, a particular atmosphere, or a dream that is taken from us. Among my favorites, however, I mention the "katatonian" "Departure", "Eschaton", so passionately dark and shadowy, the gothic "Ladykiller", the energetic title track, characterized by a truly over-the-top chorus, and the evocative, icy "Into The Lips Of The Earth".

Fans of the most uncompromising doom may not appreciate the album, perhaps attributing it to a lack of underlying ferocity, some even missing the growl ("The Angel And The"... was all clean, however), and some excessive copying, with pitfalls even in gothic. For my part, I feel inclined to highly promote the Roman group. I acknowledge the band for their originality, undeniable technical skills, an excellent expressive vein that makes them capable of drawing inspiration from others while reinterpreting them, and above all, great, mournful, apocalyptic, and feral atmospheres. Such a doom group in Italy was probably really missing: less whimsical (and still totally different) than Novembre, more shadowy than Klimt 1918, simply themselves. I believe (and hope) that the Foreshadowing will go far, they definitely deserve it.