SWALLOW THE SUN Songs From The North I, II & III

Ok, where in heavens name shall I start here? In these days where the album format is being questioned by many, and where it’s more and more common to release single tracks electronically, Swallow The Sun decides to release a full triple-album containing more than 2,5 hours of new material. That’s indeed a brave thing to do. But to sum it all up I would like to quote guitarist Juha Raivo’s words; “When bands want to release only one or two songs online because people would not have enough patience or time to listen full albums anymore. What bullshit. I think many bands are not respecting their fans at all to think that way. Or, they are just lazy bastards. I’m all about albums being whole experiences. Something you need to live through to be able really to understand the depths and meaning of music and lyrics. Who would want to read a book just from the middle, or just watch the end of the movie? Music is holy, albums are holy. But it’s a triple album and all the albums make one big picture. One long journey through the light and dark. It is not a concept album that would have continuing story, but all the albums are connected to each other.” I could not agree more to be honest! Though all 3 albums together form an entirety, they all have a slightly different musical approach. The first one is traditional doom-death metal as we know the band from the past, the second one has a more acoustic approach with everything more stripped down while the last one takes everything in a more extreme direction towards funeral doom and Swallow The Sun’s most horrific abyss. Spending two and a half hours with this dark, epic masterpiece is demanding indeed, but at the same time it’s so worth it as the genius written atmospheric material takes you through dark places and moods you’d never thought you would go. Despite their already impressing back catalogue ‘Songs from the north’ must be their best work to date.

Discography:

‘Songs from the north I, II & III’ 2016

‘Emerald forest and the blackbird’ 2012

‘New moon’ 2009

‘Hope’ 2007

‘Ghosts of loss’ 2005

‘The morning never came’ 2005