Review: Dark The Suns – 'Life Eternal'

DARK THE SUNS
'Life Eternal'
INVERSE RECORDS

Dark The Suns were one of those criminally underrated bands that were gone way before their time. The Finnish quartet blended melancholic gothic-doom metal with enticing piano leads that created an entirely unique sound. Across four albums from 2007's 'In Darkness Comes Beauty' to 2010's 'Sleepwalking In A Nightmare' the band continued to hone and perfect their sonic formula, creating some memorable tracks in the process. And then in 2013 the band announced they were no more. However, fast-forward to 2015 and the band's posthumous 'best of' compilation 'Life Eternal' sees the light of day thanks to Inverse Records.

The band's typically gothic-doom core sound is reminiscent somewhat of the likes of Amorphis, Swallow The Sun, The Eternal, and Misery Inc. but with an emphasis on both whispered and growled vocals, as well as those ever present and always stunning lead pianos to compliment the hard and aggressive riffs, the band's sound became something much more distinctive.

Songs on the compilation such as 'The Sleeping Beauty', 'All Ends In Silence', 'Alone', 'Unbroken Silence', 'Reflections', and 'Rimed With Frost' are excellent examples of this formula at its strongest and despite the fact that each of these songs is pulled from a different album it shows how well their unifying concept ran throughout each album and allows for an almost seamless flow on this compilation.

The production and mastering is of a good quality throughout. Despite the songs coming from several different releases the band always aimed for and maintained a good level of production that is reflected nicely here. The track list has also been constructed in a way that doesn't emphasise any linear presentation and instead lets each song compliment the one before and after it instead.

This is a nice final breath from a band that quite rightly deserved more than they had. One could only hope that at some point in the near future a reformation could happen and live dates based on this album performed. But in the hear and now this is an excellent epitaph of an all to brief existence. 

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