UMUR
"The Divinity of Oceans" is the 2nd full-length studio album by German doom/death metal act Ahab. The album was released through Napalm records in July 2009. It´s the successor to "The Call of the Wretched Sea" from 2006. The latter is a concept album telling the story of the hunt of the great white whale "Moby Dick" (Herman Melville´s novel from 1851). The fascination of stories of the ocean is continued on "The Divinity of Oceans", which is another aquatic themed concept release. This time telling the real life story of "The Essex", an American whaler from Nantucket, Massachusetts, which was sunk by a sperm whale in 1820. A real life event which inspired Melville to write his novel. So there is definitely some conceptual continuity at play here in terms of themes.
The story is quite dark and bizarre, and definitely fit for a metal album, as the surviving men had to abandon the shipwreck of the Essex and sail around 4.000 miles in small whaling boats, with little fresh water and food. The men died one by one of starvation and thirst, and the remaining men had to cannibalize the corpses to survive. It even came to the situation being so dire, that they had to draw lots, to determine which of the still living men had to be sacrificed for the others to eat. Yes real life horrors perfectly suited for a death/doom metal release.
Stylistically the material on "The Divinity of Oceans" continue the slow, doomy and crushingly heavy death/doom metal style of "The Call of the Wretched Sea (2006)". Ahab have honed their songwriting craft and playing skills since the debut album though, and the riffs are generally stronger and the tracks more varied and dynamic than before. The main vocal style on the album are deep unintelligible growling, but there are several sections featuring clean vocals on the album too, and they work very well, providing an extra melancholic atmosphere. Atmospheric is actually the primary word I´d use to describe "The Divinity of Oceans". It´s both an ultra heavy and at time pretty brutal and dark release, but above all it´s atmospheric and succeeds in painting pictures in the listeners mind of the desperation of the shipwrecked sailors.
As with most releases in the most slow building and slow paced part of the doom metal genre (what many people refer to as funeral doom), it takes patience and the right mood to sit through an album like "The Divinity of Oceans". To take in the massive doses of heaviness but also to savor and appreciate the more mellow and melancholic atmospheric sections. To give the artist the time to tell their story.
"The Divinity of Oceans" features a heavy, dark, and detailed sound production, which suits the material perfectly. So upon conclusion it´s a high quality sophomore album by Ahab and to my ears a step up in quality from the otherwise great debut album. A 4 star (80%) rating is fully deserved (and may even be a little too conservative. I can highly recommend this album).