Day: May 10, 2018

Rulers Of A Dying World is the debut full-length by Spaniards Son Of Sorrow, authors of a gothic metal of great class that doesn’t disfigure at all in front of that proposed by much more celebrated bands. In fact, one of the founders of the band, vocalist Alex Padina, is said to be of English nationality, but his meeting with guitarist Manu Piñeiro Sanchez took place on Iberian soil where he now resides permanently. The combination of these two musicians could not have been more appropriate: Son Of Sorrow may appear derivative to the usual insatiable, because there is no doubt that in the band’s sound there are obvious influences that bring back to Paradise Lost as well as The Foreshadowing, to go as far as Sentenced and the Finnish gothic lineage, but the fact remains that this album flows away without creating the slightest shade of boredom, scattering one after the other songs of great melodic impact and quick assimilation, without penalizing the intrinsic quality of the whole. Padina’s voice is perfect for this kind of music: warm, evocative and free from forcings or exaggerations to which are often subjected the eldritchian emulators, since the opener 1 a.m. transports us along atmospheres certainly dark but never excessively leaden, with the melody that always prevails in the long run against the rare but present metallic and modernist drives; in this context is perhaps Faith In Extinction, one of the four songs of the ep of the same name merged into the full length, to show the darkest traits, even if the subsequent Cage does not seem to be less, thanks to a valuable guitar work. In fact, the difference between the songs of the ep and the unreleased ones is non-existent, since the time lapse between the two releases is a little more than a year, not enough time to elaborate a possible stylistic change in one direction or the other, even if the most catchy songs all seem to belong to the most recent wave (1 a.m., Spiders, Since December). The bonus track La Piel, a song sung in Spanish, remains a separate episode and could be a possible way to follow in search of that peculiarity whose absence, at the moment, is the only criticism that can be made to Son Of Sorrow, whose nonchalance with which they offer these ten flowing and compelling songs, the result of a compositional vis characterized by a certain elegance and expertise in dealing with the matter, should be appreciated. All this is enough to make Rulers Of A Dying World more than just a pleasant listen.

2018 – Art Gates Records