THE SINS OF THY BELOVED — Perpetual Desolation (review)

THE SINS OF THY BELOVED — Perpetual Desolation album cover

Album · 2000 · Gothic Metal

1.5/5 · 2021-04-18
lukretion

The Sins of Thy Beloved are a Norwegian band from the Stavanger area that, like many other bands from that region, embraced the “beauty and the beast” gothic metal aesthetics in the second half of the 1990s. After releasing a highly acclaimed debut album called Lake of Sorrow, in 2000 the band returned to the studio and recorded their sophomore album, Perpetual Desolation. The debut LP is a thing of beauty. It is raw and unpolished, but has tons of character and atmosphere that manage to elevate the record well above the average of “beauty and the beast” productions of the time. The band’s second album is instead sorely disappointing. In a nutshell, everything that was good about the band’s debut has been washed out and replaced with a bland and insipid mixture of gothic and symphonic black metal à la Cradle of Filth. Unoriginal and uninspired.

The intentions were probably benign. The proliferation of “beauty and the beast” bands in the late 1990s forced many artists to try and push their musical boundaries in an attempt to stand out from the pack. My guess is that the band’s change of direction between Lake of Sorrow and Perpetual Desolation was their attempt at innovating and scaling-up their endeavors. Of course, I may be completely wrong and this may have just been a calculated attempt at riding the symphonic black/gothic metal phenomenon that was exploding around that time. Regardless of the motives, Perpetual Desolation is an album riddled with overblown and omnipresent keyboard arrangements that ride the whole gamut of what was trending at the time. Lush string and organ orchestrations, check. Eerie “atmospheric” sound effects, check. Electronic samples and loops, check. The keyboards completely dominate the album in the same overwhelming manner as they did, for example, on Dimmu Borigr’s Spiritual Black Dimensions. The guitars, which in truth were already not so prominent on the band’s debut album, completely disappear in the background, chugging away their harmless power chords song after song. This gives the album a very light but at the same time busy feel, which is largely responsible for ruining the listening experience for me.

The only thing that I like worse than the keyboard arrangements on this album is the vocals. The Sins of Thy Beloved follow the “beauty and the beast” convention of employing both male and female vocalists on their albums. Anita Auglend provides those ethereal operatic vocals that are a trademark sign of the genre (think of a slightly weaker version of Theatre of Tragedy’s Liv Kristin). Perhaps unexpectedly, the band also employs two male vocalists (guitarists Glenn Nordbø and Arild Christensen), who are both growlers. Their performance is clearly influenced by Cradle of Filth. The album features all those various types of growls that one can find on the British band’s records, from black metal shrieks to guttural death metal groans, to filtered “malign” whispers, to ominous spoken croons. The problem is: neither of these vocal styles sound particularly good on this album. Yet, they are literally all over the record. As the keyboards, the male vocals are omnipresent in each and every song, and poor Anita is forced to play a much more backing role compared to the debut album.

The whirlwind of vocal styles and keyboard extravaganza is complemented by a schizophrenic songwriting, with complex song structures, tempo changes, and constant variation of moods and atmospheres. Unfortunately, the band’s ambitions are not matched by smooth execution. The various sections do not flow well into one another. The end result is rather messy and cacophonous, leaving the listener with very few moments that truly work on the album. Even Pete Johansen’s violin, which on the debut album had played a major role in making the music feel so special and unique, on Perpetual Desolation sounds out of place and in constant competition with the overwhelming orchestral arrangements. The magic that Johansen’s violin managed to conjure up on Lake of Sorrow is completely gone, and with it most of The Sins of Thy Beloved’s mystique and allure.

Among the (few) positive notes, the sound production has clearly improved compared to the debut album and the lyrics are written more competently, even if they are still nothing to particularly write home about. I struggle to find specific songs that stand out in a positive way or have some redeeming features. Perhaps the opener “The Flame of Wrath” is the most interesting track of the album, but it might well be that this is because it’s the first song and my sense of annoyance and disappointment with the album is still bearable at this point. However, a couple of tracks stand out in a negative way. I have to mention the particularly messy and directionless “Partial Insanity” and especially Metallica’s cover “The Thing That Should Not Be”, which is literally butchered here.

As it is probably clear from the rest of the review, this album was a huge disappointment for me. I consider The Sins of Thy Beloved’s debut album one of the best in the “beauty and the beast” gothic metal genre. It’s spontaneous, interesting and with a unique sound. This album is just the complete opposite. It feels forced and affected. It is less than underwhelming and sounds like a badly faded copy of a Cradle of Filth’s record. Perpetual Desolation is the last studio album released by The Sins of Thy Beloved in their career. They will release one final live album in 2001 before disbanding. It is sad that the band fizzled out of the music scene with such a subpar release. I vastly prefer to remember them with the sound of their truly impressive debut album.