To Grieve Eternally, released on January 30, is an album by Ukrainian black metal project Inner Suffering. With six only numbered, untitled tracks, this is a very good and concise album, that has some elements of DSBM.
A very good record with slow rhythms and saturated guitars, To Grieve Eternally has some very rapid passages as well, with furious outbursts of rage. With a perfectly aligned convergence of instruments, the melodies are intelligent, wise and unpredictable, and the overall musical structure of the album is solid, coherently paced, spirited and dynamic, following an elusive chemistry of a balanced, sentimental and linear sonorous apex. Delightful and amazingly composed moments do emerge frequently within the album, in superbly arranged elements of sensational melodies.
While the album is mostly instrumental, and the melodies do present some aggressiveness, with fast passages most of the time, the album is mainly permeated by a lucid and coherent sense of artistry, where sinister, melancholic and sorrowful melodies are predominant. With an exponentially artistic soul fulfilling the essence of its spectacular and monumental sonority, To Grieve Eternally seems to be the perfect title for this work, since the essence and the soul of the sound do capture the embellishment of downward feelings in a vast array of sensibilities, but without being depressive or hurtful; something which gives to Inner Suffering the highest score for authenticity and originality within the genre.
Close of being labeled a masterpiece, this album is a genuine state of the art work. While the sound is full of elements and instrumental arrangements familiar to the genre most closely associated to DSBM, the vigor, the strength and the legitimacy of Inner Suffering’s musical abilities are unquestionable. With splendor, vitality and an unusual but restless frailty infused by an imponderable layer of expressive melancholy, this album certainly is one of the best of its kind. Technically impeccable, the soul of the quintessential traditional black metal is present within the work as well. A fundamentally interesting work, To Grieve Eternally is an exceptional album, that deserves to be fully appreciated by a loyal audience.
With an almost total absence of negative aspects, there are only good things to write about this album. This is what black metal should sound like, and yet, the record has personal values, singular merits and a very distinct identity that assimilates its artistry as quite peculiar. Undoubtedly, a major and exponentially reverberating black metal record.
Wagner