### My Silent Wake: Iv et lux aeterna

#### 10/11/10 || Altmer

Holy shit, this isn’t bad!

That is rare when you’re one minute into a song that some guy from wherever sent you to review. It’s really some guy from wherever, because I have absolutely zero idea where this band is from. I assume it is somewhere from the British Isles, because the name sounds suspiciously like My Dying Bride.

One Google search session later…

England. Well, I am not surprised. You want to know what this sounds like? My Dying Bride. That is your reference point. If you don’t like that British style of doom metal, this is not the album for you. This album is drenched with slow, drudging riffs and pounding, thumping drums in exactly the way that would make lovers of early Paradise Lost and Anathema get their panties all untied. This strokes the thighs of the ones that got off to “Turn Loose the Swans” in 1992. It is exactly in that style, maybe a bit sped up. In fact, this is exactly as good as My Dying Bride were in those days at times. Fuck.

The one thing they have not taken from My Dying Bride, unlike the fact their name format is so blatantly stolen from the band, is that their vocals do not impersonate Elmer Fudd. The growls are absolutely fucken ace. The clean vocals are a bit more sparingly used than is common in this genre, but that doesn’t matter since they are not particularly good. Also, the album peters out a bit at the end due to the lack of variety in sound.

So basically what we have here is a My Dying Bride clone with better vocals. Well, fuck me sideways with a stick. A new band I like. I think I will keep this album. Good work, fuckos. Even though having 3 drummers seems only a little pretentious…

Recommendation: Open for My Dying Bride. It’ll be like an extra hour of MDB’s back catalogue for the fans. They’ll love you for that.

- Information
- Released: 2010
- Label: Dark Balance
- Website: My Silent Wake MySpace
- Band
- Ian Arkley: lead, rhythm and acoustic guitars, e-bow and vocals
- Andi Lee: lead, rhythm and acoustic guitars, mandolin, bass and vocals
- Kate Hamilton: bass guitar, clarinet, keyboards, piano, recorder, cello, vocals and zither
- Jasen Whyte: drums, cymbals, percussion and vocals
- Steve Allan: drums, engineering and production
- Tank: drums

- Tracklist
- 1. Et Lux Perpetua
- 2. Death Becomes Us
- 3. Bleak Endless Winter
- 4. Father
- 5. Graven Years
- 6. My Silent Wake
- 7. Between Wake And Sleep
- 8. Journey’s End