Starting a blog with a simple informative purpose, without chasing after likes or approval, which are often only cosmetic, allows one to let oneself go without constraints in discovering new names that can worthily accompany the best-known names of the death doom scene of the the past and present. Of course, discovering this reality was not at all easy, given that, in order to come across the works of musicians with little inclination towards marketing, is to do a periodic search for releases on Metal-Archives and then go to bandcamp (hoping it’s there) to listen to something; this was the process that allowed me to come across The Fall Of Mother Earth, the solo project of Frenchman Mathieu Bertrand, author of a surprisingly beautiful album like Another Kind of Consciousness. Having said that this should be the first full-length released under this moniker, little is known about the talented Mathieu, except that he comes from Rennes and that his only available image suggests to an already fairly mature age: for this reason it is normal to credit him with a wealth of relevant experience, given that it is difficult to improvise an hour of music of such quality out of nothing. The sound offered by The Fall Of Mother Earth is an exquisite mix of black, doom and post-metal in which a magnificent melodic taste is always placed in the foreground, emphasising the melancholic aura that envelops the entire nine tracks. Wanting to find a counterpart, the album does not immediately recall what has been done by the most famous names and, if anything, in some respects, I find it not far off in approach to what was produced a few years ago by another French soloist, Sébastien Pierre with his Cold Insight. Another Kind of Consciousness flows with great fluidity, despite its length, and at the end of the splendid closing track, After The Mourning, the only sensation that remains is that of having listened to a work of unpredictable value, well played and interpreted vocally, both in growl and in clean when the songs take on gothic overtones, together with the regret that, as already explained, it is destined to remain the prerogative of a few intimates. Anyone who wants to experience it for themselves will realise from the very first notes of the title track, placed at the opening, that this eventuality is a real crime, but this is how it is, and one must come to terms with it.

2022 – Independent