Solitude Aeturnus - Into The Depths Of Sorrow (1991)

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Solitude Aeturnus - Into The Depths Of Sorrow (1991)

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I brought this album on a whim one day in 1991 in Our Price (remember that store, British readers?). I can't remember why, perhaps I had seen a good review of it and remembered it in the back of my mind, however back then money was limited, so it was a risk. And I'm so glad I took that risk! This album was not out of my tape player for about 4 days afterwards! Solitude Aeturnus play, I guess, doom metal, but it's not an oppressive, depressive doom. It's uptempo & I find it uplifting & positive! There's certainly an epicness about SA & a bit of a heavy metal sound, too. The production on the album is fine. The songs are well-crafted & the guitar work is excellent, but what really raises this album above others is the simply superb vocals of Rob Lowe (no, he doesn't live up to his surname!). Most will probably know him from Candlemass now, but I think that this is my favourite vocal performance from him. As befits the epic sound of the album, the song length is (fairly) epic. The shortest song is just over 5 minutes & the longest is a shade under 8. There is a lot going on in the songs as well with tempo changes, acoustic passages, slow parts, fast parts (with double bass drumming) & just damn great solos that are superbly executed & full of emotion. As for the songs themselves, they are just incredibly well-written, making this one of the few albums I actually find it hard to pick favourites on. However, my definite favourite on this one is Destiny Falls to Ruin with its great chorus. This album has been rereleased twice now, so is one of the few albums I have 3 copies of on CD now, natch. On both re-releases are demo versions of Opaque Divinity & Mirror of Sorrow. Both sound good & are slightly different than the album versions. The Metal Mind album then has a version of Transcendiing Sentinels with the original vocalist singing. He's not bad, but he's no Rob Lowe! The Brainticket album has a rather murky (rehearsal?) recording of unreleased song, CIty of Armageddon. This one is a good up-tempo one, as fast as anything on the album. For me, that makes the Brainticket rerelease better, so if you can track it down, go for that one. Perhaps Solitude Aeternus can do us a favour & re-record this on their next album! So to sum it up, this is a superb epic doom album with wonderfull soaring vocals & great lead guitar work, and most importantly, fucking awesome songs! Fans of Candlemass should snap this up (if they haven't already). And I'm so glad I took a chance on this album all those years ago…

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