Time Signature A Cold Stale Goodbye...

Genre: doom metal

I have already heard Dis Pater in action in Midnight Odyssey, which is one of his other projects (an ambient black metal project, to be more specific). While I thought that listening Midnight Odyssey was an interesting experience and that it was definitely interesting music, I have to say that it is not something I will listen to on a regular basis. Tempestuous Fall is much more up my alley, and this album offers depressive doom metal with a clear inspiration from the likes of My Dying Bride and Funeral (so already in this comparison, you have a massive stamp of approval from me).

The tempos are slow and heavy, but never too slow, and the guitar figures feature both droning notes and chords as well as proper riffs ("Old And Grey", for instance, contains a nice riff that combines droning notes with chucking guitars, and that contrast works almost sublimely). If you like slow music, you will definitely dig "Beneath a Stone Grave" which has funeral doom qualities to it, slowly building up towards a lumbering and dragging sad dirge of a melodic doom metal song (note that, in a doom metal context "lumbering", "dragging" and "sad" are positive descriptions). "Marble Tears", "A Cold Stale Goodbye" and the title track pretty much follow the same sense of depressive melodicism.

An integral part of the sound on this album is the use of atmospheric synths and, in homage to My Dying Bride, the violin. This aspect of the instrumentation results in some lush passages, some of which have an almost symphonic feel to them. The synths and violin also boosts the melancholy a bit and, over all, fit nicely into the inherently oppressive atmosphere of the album.

The vocals are part growled and part sung in a semi-moaning fashion, not unlike Aaron Stainthorpe from My Dying Bride. Some might cry "rip-off" here, but I say "homage", because Dis Pater has openly stated that his admiration for My Dying Bride is what drives Tempestuous Fall. Moreover, I would say that this is not a copy-cat release as it captures aspects of doom metal beyond the sphere of My Dying Bride.

So, yes, I like this album quite a lot, but I do have some beef with it, too. I think that the production i perhaps a bit too thin with the guitars having more of an edgy, sharp sound than a fat, bottom rich sound, which I personally prefer in doom metal. But, then again, the thin sound of the guitars paired is given an injection of reverb, which makes for a quite atmospheric sounding quality which I am sure many fans of doom metal will love.

"The Stars Would Not Wake You" is a depressive and melancholic doom metal album with lush and melodic qualities, all of which combined makes for an atmosphere of suicidal crestfallenness. Fans of funeral doom and death-doom, and particularly fans of My Dying Bride, should find it an interesting release.