In a country mainly known for both its black and death metal, it’s strange to learn that this Funeral Doom one man band hails from Poland. However, Thorns of Grief makes its Debut in 2019 with “Anthems to my remains”, a five tracked album illustrated with quite an interesting artwork.
“Anthems To My Remains” is a slow paced release filled with atmosphere and musical contrasts, as seen on the self titled first track “Thorns of Grief”. This one starts in a slow immersive pace and near its conclusion gets a lot more aggressive and somewhat groovy. Dense powerful chords that resonate within our soul and a constant feel of despair and solitude are present throughout the entire album. This, however, doesn’t mean that there aren’t some surprises in the release: the shortest song in the release -“A Longing” -, being a little under three minutes, is a piano song and the third track – “Till our rebirth” – starts with a surprising blastbeat only to drown again in their unsettling doomy chords.
When listening to some tracks, like “The Deceit Materiality”, a hint of Tryptykon-esque distortion can be felt.
The album ends on a amazing note with “illusions”, a song where one can feel stared by the abyss created by its wide and slow paced sound.
Production wise it’s a very interesting release since we can feel the deepness and density of the guitars without forsaking the haunting vocals that top it off. It has a thick powerful sound but not to the point where it loses itself in its gloominess. Actually, when speeding up, this denseness proves to create a thick wall of sound with quite a good definition to it.
The definite highlights of this record are “Till Our Rebirth” and “Illusions”, both being intense and cohere songs while still completely different. Overall, this is a pretty good album with an above average quality. It’s certainly an ambitious debut with the expected eerie feeling so common to the genre but still with the ability to extend itself outside the usual boundaries of Funeral Doom.
Thorns Of Grief are without a doubt a very promising band that will definitely deserve our attention.
6.5/10
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