Funeral – Praesentialis In Aeternum
Release Date: 10th December 2021
Label: Season Of Mist
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Genre: Funeral Doom
FFO: Skepticism, Shape Of Despair, Doom:VS, Fallen.
Review By: Martha Skourteli
Numbers 30 and 6 seem to be important for Scandinavian Doom this year. After the 6th full length of Skepticism and their 30th year in funeral doom, we’re about to get another 6th full length and again the 30th year of a band active in the same field, the amazing Funeral from Norway.
Praesentialis In Aeternum is their upcoming album, 9 years after Oratorium (2012) and it will be released by Season Of Mist on the 10th of December (Christmas comes early!). Long time no see, but we’re talking about Funeral and just knowing we’re getting new music from them is big news, meaning the thirst is about to end.
Funeral were one of the pioneer bands in the early days of their sub-genre, but they have also presented changes in their style throughout the years without ever becoming boring. Their music can contain different elements, varying from the slowest funeral, to the most melodic doom, to gothic expressions. And all of these styles are delivered in a way that’s hard not to be impressed.
The main characteristic of this new attempt is the Norwegian language. Yes, there’s no English! All lyrics are in their native language, they’re written by a friend of Anders Eek (who’s a psychologist) while they are based on philosopher Emmanuel Kant’s work. For non speakers of the language (i.e. most of us) there will be a few notes in the booklet of the album explaining what the lyrics are about. You can call the whole lyric thing a very interesting detail indeed, and probably an experiment, but it doesn’t seem to fail. After all, why always use English for lyrics when other languages can at least be tried?
The next thing one will notice after the language (actually before, since from the first song of the album you can’t miss it) is the massive presence of symphonic elements. Such elements were used also on Oratorium, but I think this time it goes way further. In my humble opinion it’s just a beautiful coating, completing the insanely good music Funeral present once again.
All songs have countless melodies; guitars are painting beauty non-stop, the drums are epic (what else would they be) with a volume that’s huge, while the whole musical result is too good for words to describe in full. It’s easy to know you’re listening to a Funeral album if you’ve heard them before! We’re talking about super artists always offering extreme quality in what they’re doing.
Vocals are 90% (maybe more) clean while I must admit that although the language was strange for me to get comfortable with, since I could not understand a thing, the voice of Sindre Nedland is a beautiful tone (I love the very low notes he presents at times) that sounds so good and so matching to Funeral ‘s music that after a few minutes I could only hear rhyming words sung on top of brilliant melodies. Trust me, lyrics won’t bother you after the first listen. Actually, after listening for a while I ended up liking the songs more with this special touch of the “different” language, that I don’t even know if I’d want them in English. Vocals will drag you into the songs, even if you don’t really get the meanings at all.
The album contains 6 songs, while there will be a deluxe version with 4 bonus tracks, including a cover of Candlemass’ Samarithan (That’s a very interesting cover if you’re into covers like me).
The songs seem to somehow outdo each other as the album goes on, but there was one that stood out quite a bit, and that was Materie. Can’t say what exactly was I loved more about it, but I think it was mainly the magic guitar solo and the vocals that at the end of the song just put spells on me. This song has a place in my favorite doom addictions.
Talking about guitar solos, it’s probably pointless to mention that you’ll find sublime guitar touches/ riffs/ solos in all songs. Funeral always did, and still do, create incredible guitar parts in the most brilliant way.
In the end, 2021 is gonna be an interesting year (obviously not for the global covid epidemic, that’s not interesting but annoying) mainly for the music that’s coming out in bulk from names that we all respect and love. Funeral put out their own distinct signature with Praesentialis In Aeternum which proves, as the album title says, that no matter what happens these guys are present forever!!
(5 / 5)
