Second long-distance release for Muscovites Who Dies In Siberian Slush, following the good debut Bitterness Of The Years That Are Lost dated 2010. The new delivery of the band led by E.S. (Evander Sinque) lies in the wake of its predecessor without representing, in fact, a true evolution of it: We Have Been Dead Since Long Ago is the classic black monolith in the guise of funeral death doom that, wanting to provide a rough direction to those who intend to approach it, lies more in the wake of German Worship than in those of fellow citizens Comatose Vigil or Abstract Spirit. In fact, don’t expect the mournful melodic openings characteristic of Russian funeral doom, as Who Dies In Siberian Slush cares more for a death-minded impact, accentuated by the renunciation of the use of keyboards. This is not to say that the work is negligible; long, enveloping tracks such as, for example, In A Jar and The Spring possess more than one noteworthy moment, but this happens, coincidentally, just as the guitars draw melodic lines that stand out precisely because they are normally sacrificed within the record in favor of rockier riffs. As mentioned, We Have Been Dead Since Long Ago perhaps pays the comparison with its predecessor, which, no doubt, had on its side a superior compositional freshness, as well as a greater underlying linearity. Separate discussion deserves a track like Funeral March No. 14, certainly fascinating as well in its grotesque procession, but objectively a bit out of context stylistically; try to imagine a band that, in accompanying the deceased on his last journey, plays a funeral march as if it were a funeral doom song: an appreciable but only partially successful experiment Overall, this work deserves attention from fans of the more extreme bangs of doom, but the feeling that remains is that of an unfinished work, where passages of great emotional impact are mixed up with more mannered ones. The final impression is therefore, that of a passing record: the Who Dies In Siberian Slush have the potential to do much better and I have no doubt that they will succeed in the future; for now only a full sufficiency, but with the certainty that they can certainly do better than that.

2012 – Solitude Productions