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Released on September 9, 2014 via Seventh Rule Recordings
Megaton Leviathan‘s new album gets off to a tremendous start. It’s so good actually, that the rest of the album simply can’t keep up. Which is a shame, but that’s not to say there isn’t enough in the remaining three tracks to keep you occupied. It’s all about that first track though.
Symphonic doom may not be a genre that is on everybody’s lips at the moment but that is essentially what we have here and ‘Past 21’, the opening track on Past 21 Beyond The Arctic Cell is a thing of majestic beauty. Its cinematic sound evokes a huge leviathan of an animal slowly slipping its way past you and the aural delights fill every crevice of your soul. It’s full of sadness, beauty and torment and is pretty much the best soundtrack you will ever hear.
With that tremendous opener, ‘The Foolish Man’ sort of suffers in its wake. Vocals are introduced but it’s hard to get a grip on the actual music which passes by without any indication of what has gone before. Thankfully amends are made with the excellent ‘Arctic Cell’, which is cold doom played out with frightening emotion. It’s a long epic which trades its slow, grinding riffs on some great atmospherics giving a cold chill to proceedings. Almost John Carpenter in the way it evoked the freezing death of the Arctic wastes, you keep expecting The Thing to jump out at you.
Finally, we are left with the tormented ‘Here Come The Tears’, which is unlike anything else here and sounds like a simple ballad, albeit an extraordinarily heavy one. It’s pained process laboriously wraps up the album and takes all sense of warm emotion from your body and mind.
There’s more than enough here to keep its head above the murky doom waters and when all is said and done this is quite a fine release. It’s more than worthy of being added to any self respecting doom fans collection and may also appeal to a post-rock crowd. Megaton Leviathan have created a nightmarish vision but one filled with enough beautiful moments that you will want to keep on returning.
