In the Depths of R'lyeh

I didn't believe this to be that bad of an album when I first picked it up. It seemed to capture the dark, opressive, mysterious ambience of the Cthulu Mythos better than most Lovecraft-inspired music I've heard.

That was at first listen. After careful consideration and multiple listens, I began to come to the conclusion that "In the Depths of R'lyeh" is not really all that great after all...as an ALBUM. I have to make that a point. Listening to this album in peices is much more enjoyable than listening to it as a whole.

You see, the songs are all EXACTLY the same. Its not that they're bad songs, but the monotony on this album is literally mind-blowing. The only thing I've heard that comes close to this level of monotony is Sleep's "Jerusalem", but at least that was just one song. "In the Depths of R'lyeh" is six.

I entertain the idea that the monotony was meant to be a part of the oppressive atmosphere of the music, but when the listener wouldn't be able to tell the difference between songs without looking at the track number, I'm less inclined to think that it was some brilliant artsy move and more the product of unplanned songwriting.

The general structure of the songs are typical funeral doom fare: A heavily distorted bass chord and sluggish, pounding drums with a simplistic, higher pitched, minor-key, note-by-note riff on top of it all, seasoned with low, growling and completely indiscernable vocals. Repeated the entire song.

I think the underlying problem with the album is that there isn't enough variation in the different song's riffs. LIstening to "Dead Dripping City", I quickly turned it to the next song and the riff was almost the same, but in a different key.

Enough of the bad, I do not mean this to be a negative review and it isn't my purpouse to completely bash the album. Any of the songs on "In the Depths of R'lyeh" damn near perfectly capture the aforementioned Lovecraftian atmosphere. The music brings to mind giant, misshapen creatures, huge stone cities. The music is eerie and mysterious, the perfect soundtrack to any nightmare of lumbering horrors.

Catacombs made a decent album here just so long as the songs are listened to individually and never as a whole album. Doing the latter could cause you to become annoyed with the music.