Torn Beyond Reason

Like many others here who have reviewed work by Woods of Desolation, I discovered the band on Youtube through Austere and Forest Mysticism, both projects by WoD members. Though Austere and Forest Mysticism have either now split up or been placed in cold storage, WoD is still an ongoing entity. Like those projects too, WoD play very melancholy and melodic depressive black metal with post-rock influences and a stronger emphasis on musicianship than on atmosphere.

The first thing that hits listeners is the raw fury and intense emotion in the music, bolstered by the rhythms and dense showers of BM-guitar noise. The only issue I have is that the vocals are thin and pushed far back into the mix, and then blurred over with reverb so much so that individual words sung can hardly be made out. Although the music can be good and robust in parts, with strong thundering drums, over several tracks it starts to sound generic and songs lack individuality. For this kind of depressive BM, songs should have some distinctive melodies or riffs that they can be remembered by, and the album is lacking in these.

The singing needs to be much clearer as most songs have lyrics to the extent that the lyrics form an essential part of most songs which are structured around them. The thick distortion over the vocals ends up a disadvantage as the pain and agony expressed in the singing and vocals have to fight through the blurriness.

Of the six tracks featured, the stand-out is "The Inevitable End" by virtue of its length and placing in the middle of the album. The brief instrumental "November" is not a bad piece either, more because it's a gentle acoustic breath of fresh air after the angst that has gone before. It transforms into a powerfully hopeful appeal that in all the darkness and despair experienced so far, there is the light and warmth that can be found through contact with a sympathetic other. The short track also draws attention to the fact that there's very little sense of volume dynamics in the recording: the music starts at a certain volume level and stays there. This makes everything sound flat and listeners may get a sense that there's nothing being held in reserve that they should wait for.

The album is perhaps best heard as one complete showcase of the depth of depression and the utter blackness and despair that one descends into, feeling that there is nothing more to life than the coldness of death, and the desperate search for light, a way out of that blackness. Individual tracks are best approached as chapters forming a definite narrative that reaches its climax in the second-last and last tracks. Even if heard in this way though, the album doesn't offer very much beyond a trio of thundering drums, constant guitar barrage and shouty vocals fighting to be heard above the guitars and percussion.

Were you a fan of Austere? Well stop the presses, order this and prepare for awesomeness. Woods of Desolation basically take off from where Austere left off, except they do everything better. From the vocals to the music itself, this is just fantastic. I'm not going to lie, I have a massive boner over this album and I can't recommend it enough.

For the uninitiated among us, Woods of Desolation play a heart-wrenching, melodic style of black metal. Although I do use this band quite a lot in comparisons, this is basically like While Heaven Wept playing black metal, you know those melodies they utilize? The kind that absolutely pull on your heartstrings until you feel they won't let go, releasing at the most opportune moments? Yeah that shit. Well just imagine a black metal back-drop, some of said melodies being tremolo-picked and you have Woods of Desolation.

I've really taken my time getting to know this album, racking up a ridiculous amount of listens, and its power just doesn't recede. In fact, I'd say I feel stronger about this album with each listen, this is quickly rising up to being among my favorites of the style. Now, trying to give something in the way of unbiased feedback and criticism, I will say this has some of that post-black and depressive black that some fans of the genre seem to loathe. There are also clean vocals in small doses, which are quite good and certainly better than the almost emo clean vocals heard on Austere. My main criticism (and probably only) would be that the album does tend to stick to the same formula throughout with the exception of the short "November", however this is a double-edged sword. On the one hand the album lends well to being listened to in one go, and on the other it makes it a little harder to dip in and out.

However, in saying that I can still happily name standouts, and whilst the sound is fairly similar across the board it is always interesting and dynamic. Fans of acts such as the aforementioned Austere as well as acts such as Weakling and Shining are definitely going to want to get a hold of this quick. Torn Beyond Reason is an amazing album, and had I taken the time to delve into this more last year it would have ranked very high in my end-of-year list. Tracks such as the title track and "The Inevitable End" pull your heart right down into oblivion, but it's an enjoyable stay and a small glimmer of hope hinted at throughout. Take the plunge with Woods of Desolation, you won't regret it.

Originally written for http://www.metalcrypt.com

Sad, melancholic and epic are the three main adjectives with what I'm able to classify this Woods Of Desolation's «Torn Beyond Reason». Impressive!

I found Woods Of Desolation a few months ago through YouTube and since then I'm in love with this australian band. Equally, I also found Austere, another australian group, that unfortunately have splitted up during May 2010 - even so, they have left two great albums in its legacy: "Withering Illusions And Desolation" and "To Lay Like Old Ashes". However, Tim Yatras (aka Sorrow in Austere) did not throw away his role in the arts of darkness by joining forces with D., from Woods Of Desolation, and, as guest, Yatras cooperated on drums and on vocals while D. was on guitars and on bass. From this cooperation was created one of my 2011's favourite discs: "Torn Beyond Reason".

This year of 2011 also marks the reissue of their first album, "Toward The Depths" which was released in 2008, and in three years the level of production and creativity increased a thousand times.

The album starts with the catchy, melodic and melancholic title-track, followed by the "Darker Days" song. This track starts with an accoustic intro, followed by a little electronic passage and about this point I could see some risk to put such thing in a record like that, in other hand I think it fits perfectly if they wanted to innovate, but I don't want to go further into this subject, because it is an isolated case.

With "An Unbroken Moment" comes the epic, sad and boundless soundscapes. Just beautiful! The blend between the lead guitar and the choirs is simple, but undeniably chilling. This kind of picture continues in the next song, "The Inevitable End", mainly expressed by the melodic guitar, but I felt that the deepest feeling lies in the previous song.

After the instrumental track called "November" that could be used by any band to leave the stage while the crowd is clapping their hands, erupts the last, most epic and most emotive song of the entire "Torn Beyond Reason" album: "Somehow...". The clean vocals are once again used (those type of vocals can also be heard in the "Darker Days" track), but the studio work for that matter was more refined on this song than on the other - the voices are louder and more listenable. The whole song works as a farewell, from the lyrics till the way it ends. The finishing part culminates with a strong, heavy, fast and melancholic environment that can spread sadness and a sense of nostalgia all over the room.

During the several times I listened to this melancholic and depressive masterpiece I did not only find sadness and solitude, but also captured some scent of hope that is fueled by the nostalgia ambience. The only picture I can foresee from this album is someone sitting in the corner of a room not crying about the unlucky and unfortunate life, but crying about things he or she could have taken and did not and now that person is consumed by a serene repentance.

Earlier, I said the level of production increased from previous works and it is true because the sound is more polished than in other releases, but not in an extreme manner, otherwise I fear the dark and gloomy essence would be lost. In other way, the vocals are still heard from the bottom of a well or from the edge of an abyss screaming for compassion and it is simply moving and suffocant if you are really into the scene.

If you realised you lost something or someone important and want to be surrounded by this black cloud of suffering, I advise you this Woods Of Desolation's "Torn Beyond Reason". Even though, I keep warning you about the scent of hope, however it only can be found by the stronger.

Originally written for and posted at Riff Magazine

Like I mentioned in my recent review of Woods of Desolation’s EP release Sorh, I had my doubts about the upcoming second full-length that was said to change the direction a little and cleanse the sound. And now that I’ve heard Torn Beyond Reason, I can’t but confirm those claims. Whereas the band’s previous material leaned more heavily on obscure and nature-like foggy atmosphere, Torn Beyond Reason is basically Austere’s To Lay Like Old Ashes part two: rather well produced majestic depressive black metal with some post-rock influences.

I can’t stress enough how much this is identical to the previously mentioned band and album, and no surprise there, knowing how closely these groups are intertwined: from the impressive howls and screams (and clean vocals of ”Somehow...”) to the tight battering and - most importantly - the tremolo picked melodies full of sorrow, everything is done the same way throughout the 38 minutes. A perfect length for the album, by the way. Some differences do occur, though: the three-minute interlude ”November” is a little surprise here with its hopeful acoustic strumming that builds up to include the rock instrumentation, not quite what you would expect from the song title and from a Woods of Desolation album - perhaps more likely from Anathema’s last year’s offering.

Do I necessarily need another To Lay Like Old Ashes if the differences are few and far between? Well, Torn Beyond Reason does offer some brilliant moments, such as the title track and ”Darker Days” that provide some truly heart-rending melodies, and also the 9-minute centerpiece ”The Inevitable End” starts to show signs of ingenuity after repeated listens. Thanks to these best moments of the album - that occur just about enough often - I could say yes, Torn Beyond Reason is a worthy album and it would be a shame to rate it poorly.

In terms of musicianship and production, I’m sure this album is a step forward for Woods of Desolation’s members, but for me it’s one step back from evolving into something more unique; instead, Torn Beyond Reason follows the current trends a tad too closely and hence consists of maybe too unsurprising elements. In a way, it’s not a bad thing when it’s done this convincingly, but on the other hand these similar melodies don’t have the same impact anymore because most of them have been heard already. Once again I’m interested to hear how the band evolves from here: if another album like this is to be expected, I’m not sure will I be that interested anymore.

3.5 / 5
[ http://www.vehementconjuration.com/ ]

Woods of Desolation represents a style of black metal that concentrates entirely on conveying feelings of grandeur and perhaps melancholy – to describe it briefly but accurately, this is epic black metal. However, to call it black metal means to stretch the definition quite far from the original. This band has absolutely nothing in common with the pioneers or early bands of black metal genre other than some basic things related to instrumentation and sound: reverb and distortion have not been used parsimoniously here, and the vocal style is clearly a black metal shriek. The production is thin, full of reverb, somewhat cold, yet deep. It termso f sound, it meets the basic black metal stereotypes. What's worlds apart from so-called true black metal is aesthetics. Black metal is cold, dark, mysterious and evil – sometimes hideously ugly, sometimes enchanting in its beauty. Black metal is nocturnal. Woods of Desolation is bright, clear, hopeful, a glimmer of light in darkness. Of course, in order to take black metal as a form of art to a higher level, there must be emotional variety in it. Moments of light and grandeur are sometimes welcome in black metal, even if it means taking the risk of bringing contrariety to the music. However, Woods of Desolation is nothing but said contrariety. It has no darkness to balance out the light, and as a result, no power to achieve moments of truly great emotional height.

The music is the complete opposite of itself. Even the lyrics are in complete contradiction with the music. Do not be fooled with the ”depressive” imagery, for it's likely you've never heard more upbeat black metal. Musically, ”Torn Beyond Reason” is complete melodrama. Black metal artists have long since realised the effect of high-speed blast beats in heightening the emotional impression of the music, and the harsh vocal style is the most tangible expression the music's dominant emotions. Here, both of these elements can be found, and not surprisingly, they sound ridiculous when combined with the most saccharine post-rock riffing imaginable. Can any true emotion the songwriters felt warrant such theatrical celebration of grandeur? Of course not – this is blatantly pretentious, or else the songwriters had taken copious amounts of extacy prior to writing the album. This is an insolent attempt at appealing to post-rock audiences within a black metal sham. If you consider Alcest to be great music, this will most likely sound stunning to you. Do not be fooled by the outward appearance of this band. Within the shell of false imagery and pretensions of black metal lies little but fluff. This music entirely lacks a hard core.

What ultimately dooms this album is not the lack of artistic ambition here – of course music can be enjoyable even if its banal and unartistic as long as it's otherwise impressive – but the fact that the riffs on ”Torn Beyond Reason” are not very good even individually. They are vague, intangible, unmemorable and, I suspect, formulaic and calculated. What's more, they're sometimes highly annoying. This is not the artistic self-expression of a band of musicians. This is the product of businessmen, or the self-deceit of pretentious people in denial of their lack of talent. I've not heard such ostentatious false greatness even in post-rock.

Sorh really was one of the most deterrent records of the last years and the aftertaste it has left in my mouth really did scare me off. So it did take a little while until I actually tried listening to Torn beyond Reason, not least because the beginning of the title track did bring memories of Sorh back, as they kind of reuse a melody there. After the first daunt you soon will realise, that this was just an unhappy coincidence and they matured a lot in terms of production, composition and sound in general.

The mentioned melody was first used in the song The Leaden Sky Torn on Sorh which was the reason for the first shock you might get while starting to listen to the new record. The production on the whole record has matured a lot and so it came that the sound is crystal clear and perfect for the atmosphere of the record. Howsoever the sound of the guitars is not very clear and well defined, it is more blurred and flowing into each other, without stating that this would be a flaw. The other instruments are using the frequences that are left unused and so the whole frequenzy range is filled with sound. All instruments are equally present, the only flaw in terms of production are the vocals.

The biggest change from Sorh to Torn Beyond Reason can be found in the melodies, as they are far beyond the status of being depressive and they are creating a really massive atmosphere. The vocals are glutted with effects and are pending between clear vocal lines and desperate growls. It happens a lot, that the vocals are in the same frequency range as the guitars and in combination with their subtle production it can be hard to hear them from time to time.

The sound may be dominated through melancholic black metal elements but there are huge post-rock/post-black metal influences, like they could be found in the later Austere records. This usage of modern influences does affix a stamp to the sound. The influences are not only positive, as the sound, which covered nearly every frequence from the beginning, sometimes is overladen which degrades the quality of the composition.

Another negative point is, although it may not be the biggest flaw of all times, that some melodies and drumpatterns are reused throughout the record. If you want to see this positive, you may label it as conceptual. To not conclude with something negative, I want to emphasize the production, as it is really rare that the frequency ranges are used in such an effective way, and it is even rarer that the perfect balance between rawness and great melodies was found like on this record.

Conclusion:

Woods of Desolation seem to take all the critics to their hearts and extracted the basic core of their music from their previous records and then are presenting it with a new livery. This new livery does provide their songs with an incredibly appeal, so that you have to listen to it. The post-rock/post-black metal influences are woven perfectly into the basic material and are enhancing the positve aspects. Although there are many perfect moments, there are some flaws as well. First of all the similiarities between some melodies and drum patterns should be mentioned, another flaw would be the problem of the vocal lines or that the sound seems to be overladen from time to time. There is some room for improvements though, and I really hope that further records can cover up the flaws. Torn Beyond Reason may not be the record of the year, but it is definetaly a safe bet, so buy it!
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nilgoun / http://threnodies.com

Most of the people who have been following that whole wave of Melancholic Black Metal bands since, let's say, 2006, probably must have noticed Australian band Austere. With their very typical guitar sound and tortured moans they gained quite a lot of attention, releasing two albums that were musically speaking far superior to most demo's and full-lengths being released in that genre. Unfortunately somehwere in spring 2010 they decided to quit Austere. Meanwhile there was this other Australian band called Woods of Desolation, for which Mitchell Keepin (one of the Austere members) already did some session vocals on their 2009 EP Sorh. Woods of Desolation creates Black Metal pretty much in the same fashion as Austere once did, so much even that after listening the first two tracks of Torn Beyond Reason I started wondering whether there weren't any Austere members involved. Well big surprise, it's Tim Yatras (the other Austere member) who is responsible for both the drumming and the vocals on this album (it also seems he did the production, but I will come back to that subject later).

For those who aren't familiar whith Austere's work I will try to explain what their, and Woods of Desolation's sound is all about. Something I already mentioned is their very typical guitar sound, it's not your average distorted Black Metal sound, but more some kind of droning melodic blur, in some cases accompanied by a synth mixed very much to the background. Tim Yatras' drum sound is almost as typical as the guitar on this album, he has a very own style of drumming, especially the fills really make it clear that it's Tim drumming on here and not somebody else. When everything is put together there is only one way to describe the sound with one word, and that's massive, it seems to cover each frequency; from a deep rumbly bass to the high-pitched moans that are used so often in this style of music.

In the introduction I already mentioned that I suspect Tim Yatras of doing the production of this album, or at least helping D. with his guitar set-up. This because the guitar sound on Torn Beyond Reason is just practically the same as the guitar sound on the last three Austere releases. Normally I wouldn't be charmed by something like that, but in this case I am; I have always adored Austere's guitar sound and thus I am very happy to hear it back on a Woods of Desolation release.

There is a very clear reason why I didn't put the word depressive in the genre section, normally bands like these are labeled as depressive or even suicidal. When I think about depressive music I think about Trist's Sneni or Perfume Genius' Mr. Peterson, the overall atmosphere on this album just wouldn't be justified by calling it depressive, I would say it lays somewhere between melancholia and nostalgia, two quite similar emotions that represent this album much better in my humble opinion. As a result, this album could with ease be described as beautiful, the blurry guitar layers, the melancholic type of melody and the desperate moans, when it all comes together it just sounds so damn fine.

Torn Beyond Reason is qualitatively speaking a terrific album, which deserves, and will probably gain, a lot of attention. Even 'though their huge, massive sound is very similar to Tim Yatras' previous project Austere, this album could be considered as a progression since Austere was disbanded, and will definitely be heard more often by my neighboors.


Originally published on http://amplifiedstrawberry.blogspot.com

A while back I reviewed Austere's 2009 masterpiece, To Lay Like Old Ashes. The band displayed a massive amount of stellar musicianship and beauty through their perfectly crafted music. I was rather sad when Austere disbanded in 2010, but Woods Of Desolation is still active, and on this album, they seem to be continuing Austere's work. Tim (Sorrow), a member of Austere, plays drums and keyboards on this release and also provides vocals. The result is, what might be called To Lay Like Old Ashes part 2, beautiful, melancholic black metal with a heavy influence from post-rock and shoegaze.

The album begins with the title track, a scathing whirlwind of gorgeous riffing and lightning-fast drumming that breaks down to a slower tempo around halfway through. The production is very similar to Austere's sophomore as well, enabling every tiny element to be heard. The final riff in the song is extremely moving, Sorrow's vocals are definitely at their best on this release. "Darker Days" is a mid-tempo song beginning with some brief acoustics, and some clean vocals. The singing is sadly quite buried in the mix, and comes off more like mumbling at times. Still, this song is every bit as good as the last, the grandiose, epic riffs as prevalent as ever.

Things begin to get even better with "An Unbroken Moment", a speedy song featuring lots of blast beats, soaring keyboard-driven harmonies, and flying double bass pedals. About halfway through, the song dissolves into an atmospheric interlude, driven by swirling ambiance and a string instrument. Then the instruments come in, even stronger than before, carrying the listener through a landscape of tortured beauty until the end of the song. Definitely one of the album's best tracks.

"The Inevitable End" is another massive song, beginning with a beautiful riff that cascades like a wall of falling rain. Sadly, save for the amazing vocals, the brief acoustic bit six minutes in, and the last couple of riffs in the song, it tends to drag a bit, and isn't as memorable as the last few songs. It's still an impeccable song, but Woods Of Desolation can do better. The brief interlude "November" comes next, an acoustic tune that gradually returns to the metal realm. Although a very good song, it could easily have been fleshed out a bit more.

The final song, "Somehow", is the best one here, and the most memorable for sure. Beginning almost hopefully, some clean vocals enter. Even though these are still low in the mix, they are much better than the ones in "Darker Days." Eventually the screams arrive, and they fit marvelously with the slow, beautiful guitars. Things progress this way for a while, until breaking down towards the 3.5 minute mark. Now the speed comes again, and oh is it glorious. The double bass, the riffing, the subtle keyboard... it's nearly perfect. Then it all comes down in a gorgeous wall of sound that will blow everything else you've ever heard out of your ears. A perfect way to end such a song.

Torn Beyond Reason acts as an amazing follow-up to Austere's swansong. If the clean vocals were louder, if "The Inevitable End" were a bit more memorable, and if "November" were a bit longer, this one would have been another 100. It may not be perfect, but it's still pretty damn close. A must for any fan of atmospheric, or depressive black metal.