Day: May 12, 2022

Finnish Depressed Mode had put in evidence at the end of the first decade of the century with two excellent full length as Ghosts of Devotion (2007) and …for Death… (2009), moving in a decisive manner from gothic death doom atmospheric of the first to a sound from the powerful symphonic imprint in the next, and putting themselves in the wake of an album like Septicflesh’s Communion, released just a year earlier. If the closeness to the seminal Greeks was detectable in that approach, it must be said that the sound of the band led by Otto Salonen kept firmly their roots doom as well as lyrical content strongly depressive. After a long absence from the scenes, the return of Depressed Mode finally occurs with an album programmatically titled Decade Of Silence, in which the thread of the speech abruptly interrupted with …for Death… is reknotted and perfected, keeping most of the line-up of the previous work with the substantial difference of a major change regarding the female voice, entrusted to Veronica Bordacchini of Fleshgod Apocalypse, singer of operatic school very different from the well-known Natalie Koskinen, engaged in the previous work with its more ethereal vocals. A certain contiguity with the Italian band can be found in the most furious passages, when the rhythms become pressing and the growl of Salonen (also good with clean vocals) dominates the scene, but the peculiarity of Depressed Mode remains precisely that of skillfully merging the solemnity of the orchestrations with a painful and melancholy-soaked pace, differentiating themselves from both Septicflesh and Fleshgod Apocalypse, revealing themselves as alternative in the same stylistic area to the Norwegian Abysicc, as the symphonic death doom of the latter is more affected by the black metal matrix of the musicians. If the opener Death Walks Among Us is a device ready to explode the speakers and the next song, Endless November, also enchants thanks to the entry into the scene of Bordacchini, the rest of the tracklist is maintained at a good level (very beautiful the most suffused As The Light Dims) even if you can not help but notice that in the second half of the work the tension tends slightly to fade, accomplice in my opinion a total duration of almost seventy minutes; in fact, the fruition of such “full” sounds in a prolonged way is not easy and this risks to make the listener reach the end of the album a bit saturated, just when Salonen places a song like Aeternus, a real gem of atmospheric and dramatic funeral doom. This is a forgivable and understandable sin, considering that after “a decade of silence” is normal to have a lot to say and communicate, the fact remains that the return of Depressed Mode turns out to be as welcome as ever and qualitative in content, resulting obviously recommended to those who appreciate the sounds of all the bands mentioned, without forgetting that in this specific case this album is also imbued with a darker and more depressive aftertaste, in deference to the moniker.

2022 – Inverse Records