Year: 2025
Label: Obelisk Polaris Productions
Death/doom is a wide spectrum, ranging from Winter’s crust/hardcore influenced lurching heaviness, to Coffins’ Hellhammer-style boneheaded heaviness, to beyond. In the larger spectrum, an odd sort of outlier is the romantic, gothic style of death/doom pioneered by acts such as My Dying Bride and Paradise Lost. Partially, because its take on death/doom is quite different from everything else – and partially, because it’s probably the most popular take on the genre hybrid.
This gothic, atmospheric style has its modern day proponents; from a Finnish perspective, the most prominent of these is Swallow The Sun. Incidentally, today, Swallow The Sun and My Dying Bride share a singer. However, gothic death/doom is not a genre there’s an overabundance of, so any new name is welcome. Enter Swedish Solus Rex.
This three track EP sees the solo project approach its death/doom with a decidedly old school touch, which hearkens back to the earliest days of the genre. Think some of the very first My Dying Bride releases, back when there still was a touch of death metal in the band’s sound.
This means consistently lurching tempos (opening track The Hollow Man kicks things off in a mid-tempo fashion, but things slow down from there) and slow, melodic riffs that echo tragedy. The vocals are a surprisingly raw and competent, hoarse growl which remind me a bit of Nick Holmes’ style on the first few Paradise Lost albums. A bit of synthesizers in the background serve to add atmosphere, but their role is absolutely diminutive.
There’s not much in terms of originality here. For the most part, Scenes From Yonder Life feels like a pretty faithful re-creation of the classic sound pioneered by the British drab three in their early days. It gets to the point where the lack of character is a bit detrimental, even: sure, this is competent, but it’s also absolutely derivative, a pastiche of things already done.
This reduces the meaningful impact of the music. On a surface level, Solus Rex does invoke the feelings of melancholy, loss and tragedy that are the pure essence of this style. The melodic guitars are laden with sorrow, the growls lace the atmosphere with spiritual torment. But the effect is lessened because it’s so thoroughly familiar. Where early My Dying Bride strummed chords of authentic pain, Solus Rex are a fading echo.
As a result, Scenes Of Yonder Life is a decent enough release to warrant checking out if you’re a fan of the genre, but it fails to penetrate deeper into anything meaningful. The agony sole member Peter Svensson has put on tape may be authentic enough, but in dressing it into this all too familiar form, Solus Rex to a large extent emasculate it into something lesser. Which means that, in the end, even for fans of the style Scenes Of Yonder Life will have very limited lasting appeal.
Only Death Is Real 