Withersoul "s/t" CD
[Oak Knoll]
This Virginia band offers some incredibly promising doom on this lengthy demo (four tracks in over a half-hour), exemplified immediately by the sparse chord progressions and somber organ melodies in the intro "Dirge for the Forsaken". But when "Now Yours..." begins it's clear that this act is pretty heavily influenced by classic representatives of this genre, like My Dying Bride and Paradise Lost in their prime, with lots of slow chord progressions, pounding bass/drum rhythms, occasional clean breaks, dark melodic lead lines, and an array of vocal styles - driven by either excellently tactful operatic female singing or deep growls, with a few sneering screams accenting things on occasion. I tend to be very iffy about operatic singing, but as used here those vocals are very strong: She can hit the notes, she doesn't get overdramatic or strained with her harmonies, and it fits the atmosphere of the music. The songwriting, while long, does offer a lot of tempo changes and variation too. "Forever, I Will Burn", for example, picks up the pace quite a bit with some quicker chords that bear minimal resemblances to melodic Swedish death metal, while also throwing down some classic doom with a little edge of Louisiana sludge tossed in for good measure. The tracks get longer and longer as the demo goes, hitting the apex with the 14-minute "Exasperation's Tears", which is of course a little slower and more persistent in its traditional framework, straight down to the spoken passage and use of piano/synths and an openly melodic bass break. I would recommend using the deeper vocal growls more often than the sneers, simply because the growls are more forceful and a little less typical these days, but the songwriting is damn good here, rarely feeling disjointed and usually running through changes fluidly, so I'm sure they'll progress with time. Shit, I mean, they've got a few vocal lines that are almost catchy, which is rare for this stuff. Honestly, the recording is the only thing that needs work, and for a demo this sounds fine. I just know for a fact that this band could sound amazing under the right circumstances. They used a drum machine on this recording, which isn't optimal of course, but it works for their purposes here. They've since acquired a live drummer and it damn sure makes a difference, so beyond that I'd say they ought to beef up the mix with more of a bass presence and give the guitars a little extra crunch and presence. The guitars are the core right now, but they need a little bit more oomph to really nail it home, you know? Maybe cut back on some of the reverb on the lead lines and just let the rhythm guitars crush, because they're damn near right on the money (just getting a little unnatural sometimes), and the clean tones are great. The vocals sound fine as well, so all in all they've done well. The CD-R comes in a simple, nice looking sleeve xeroxed onto thick gray stock with some faint figurative images and a logo alongside the lyrics, which are of course rather bleak and illustrative of this style of music: "Can you see the hell in my eyes? Does my suffering shine out from me? Is my pain plain to see? It was never much before now, Just a slow rise of displeasure..." Great stuff. They've got a few things to clean up at the outskirts, but this is a very fucking strong demo, and I really do expect big things from this band. Anyone who's into straight doom metal without too many bells and whistles should look into this band for sure, and keep an eye out, because with the right opportunity they'll do some damage. (7/10)
Running time - 32:24, Tracks: 4
[Notable tracks: they're all good to my ears]
Withersoul - http://www.soundclick.com/withersoul/

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