Sorrow

It's sort of hard to not to at least mention The Gathering when talking about this band- they aren't terribly similar in any audible sense, but there's that similarly dreamy gothic grace from the singer, a really, really good bunch of musicians writing some really lush stuff, and a sort of doom-y but not terribly heavy sound that's the main backbone of the whole thing. Indeed, it wouldn't surprise me if this album didn't heavily influence The Gathering when they were getting Anneke and writing Mandylion; the timing certainly suggests that.

However, while that band was busy pursuing a lush, atmospheric rock/doom hybrid, this is a fair bit more doomy and altogether bleaker; a lot starker, way more clean guitars, and a more intense sound when the guitars and (really good) drums get all heavy and powerful. Not as anthemic, perhaps, or as immediately melodic and accessible. More esoteric in general really; the dreamy folkiness and sometimes unusual chord progressions suggest a bit of Dead Can Dance influence. Or, err, Enya.

But seriously this is really good, and as with most good female fronted bands (or, it should be said, good bands in general) the vocalist isn't the star of the show, but another instrument adding to the overall music. And man, the music is really high quality; 3rd and the Mortal try a few different things here and pull it all off aplomb. Whether it's the tasty medieval folk of the title track or the different angles these guys take at doom (even approaching something like death/doom in parts of "Ring on Fire"), the music's been done brilliantly- songs kept relatively short, very moody and atmospheric. Probably helps that this is an EP, too- I'd be hard pressed to listen to this stuff it was spread over something like 80 minutes, but instead it's short and really leaves you wanting more- I guess maybe a 5th song would've been good, but for the most part the restrained length of the whole things works great. There's no filler to be found here.

Yeah, overall this is a damn cool little release that's worth checking out if you enjoy some gothic or doom metal, or perhaps just need something that you can chillax too. I really like it, and I can definitely see it being in regular rotation for a long time.

This is the first release from Norway's phenomenal purveyors of strongly emotional, beautiful and etherial music, sometimes encroaching into metal territory. I suppose this is the release that can most easily be classified as "doom" or even "doom metal", something which I would not really say about their later releases, which are something greater and somehow more encompassing.

The four songs on offer here are majestic, extremely melodic hymns with very strong guitar lines and sparse use of keyboards. They were, at the time, quite a guitar based band, though it would not be long before they ventured into more experimental, ambient territory. This release features the voice of Kari Rueslaten, who is considered something of a demigoddess for her work with this band as well as with Storm. I have to say that, although I still like her, my enthusiasm for her performance in t3atm has dimmed a bit since hearing their most recent album. Simply put, when Kari is on, she is really on, and sounds heartwrenchingly gorgeous...however, at times her voice has a mewling quality that I find a bit grating. Strangely enough, I have some of her solo recordings and though she sounds more like Tori Amos than ever now, her slightly whiny voice doesn't bother me at all. I've thought about it and I believe the reason is that her voice fits the sparser, more direct and straight emotional approach of her own songwriting more than the lush and finely crafted landscapes her former band have always attempted to create. At any rate, kari is hardly horrible on this release, and when she has the whole band to back her up she sounds great. There is some really nice acoustic guitarwork to be found here, and i would say it is used about as much as the distorted sections. Someone once described early T3ATM as acoustic music with ocasional metal outbursts and I think this is pretty accurate, even more so on the next release. There isn't really much more to be said about this. It's a beautiful release to be sure, a very strong debut EP...but it's probably the least special of T3ATM's works, simply because, at the time of this writing, there are so many other bands doing what T3aTM was doing in 94, when The Gathering, who have never, imo quite had this degree of craftsmanship, were still messing about with a death metal singer.