Two Years of Grief

It seems to me like the current most recent Rise To The Sky album (surely soon to be succeeded, given the hectic release schedule to date) can be ranked as one of the most dynamic from the solo project thus far. When reading the genre of doom death next to the band’s name, it’s important to note that the music that Sergio González Catalán makes is atmospheric, which implies that riffs and heaviness do not take much of the listener’s attention - rather the mood of the album is key. Mood and atmosphere naturally can’t be ignored when your release is named Two Years of Grief, and in fact this seventh album in total (in just 5 years) marks the end of the emotional road that began with the death of the composer’s father that was subsequently explored on Per Aspera ad Astra. The dynamic quality I spoke of does indeed have the feel of endings, of fierce battles and resolutions, so prepare for some climactic music.

The manifestation of this conclusion comes in both much heavier and much softer music than was heard on the rather samey Stay with Me When You’re Gone. That album forged its steady Saturnus path, and though that feature remains on Two Years of Grief, most songs deviate from the “slow, sorrowful, sultry” formula for at least part of their length. The immediate sign of that shift comes in opener ‘Funeral for My Home’ and the up-tempo section in the second half. Initially commencing with piano and violin, which also appear elsewhere, I was not really prepared for a much more forceful riff to follow a sort of post-rock escalation, where Sergio sounds like a true death metal monster before reintroducing some of the shimmering melodies over the top of the tumultuous riffing. The fairly muscular drum performance (given by Emidio Ramos) gets its second test right away with ‘Burdened by Grief’, which hits high speed early on, this time with the kind of glistening elemental fury we know from Insomnium. Indeed, the more I listen to Rise To The Sky the more I feel that the Chilean’s spiritual home may be Finland, both in terms of the melodeath scene there and also the funeral doom one.

These bursts of action near the start of the album have no regular configuration within the songs, appearing neither for choruses nor as final climaxes, so it sets up an uncertainty over structure that prevails for much of the listen. At the other end of the scale, the title track opts for extremely gentle means, misty synths, creaking violin, and fragile acoustic guitar combining around a sombre female spoken word performance. This really feels like the calm inside the storm and the beginning of the end of the 2 years mentioned in the title. The remainder of the tracks aim more for the middle ground that Rise To The Sky previously occupied, mournfully thoughtful leads trickling out over slow riffs and laboured growls, with ‘From My Blood I Bring You Home’ an especially enervating closer of near funeral means. Curiously, the version I have seems to be nearly twice as long as the original, and I can’t work out what is contained in the second half, since I hear the regular song stop at the appropriate time. Still good stuff though. Bonus track ‘My Light Dies’ is also kicking around in a more official capacity, and is a gentle ditty with clean vocals that complements the album well but needn’t be considered vital to the overall emotional journey.