Convocation – Ashes Coalesce (Weight of the World Funeral Doom)
So yeah yet again I’m convinced that this type of doom needs to hit with everything it’s got. You want a funeral, make it sound like one without the silliness. The slowness, the trudging steps, the abject suffering. It has to hit and hit well to succeed. Slow itself is not enough. It needs force. Like the weight of your bitter, pointless life upon your body, suffocating the last ounce of effort upon which you clutch until you realize, as we all do, that you’re basically pointless. A mere speck of matter in darkness eternal. Actually I feel pretty cool about myself so that’s on you but Convocation almost broke me with Ashes Coalesce. These guys have a great way of fashioning an encircling sound, for lack of a better description. I try my best, but sometimes I can only spurt out nonsense. But that’s pretty good.
Ashes Coalesce has the dark drag that defines funeral doom; there’s an orchestral quality to the music and the vocals are varied and trained. Drawn out, absolute zero growls like some awakening ice mountain combined with “my child just died” shrieking and beautifully rendered singing (like the legit kind) is simply spectacular. And when Convocation slips, every so slowly, into death metal that is more symphonic than crush, they move into more interesting territory. Ashes Coalesce is finely mixed and not simply a hodge-podge shift from funeral to death; they’re clear experts at melding and it’s given me a resurgence of hope for what sometimes seems a rather standardized genre when fashioned by less capable hands. Also makes me rather pissed the damn special-ed vinyl is already sold out WTFFFFFFFFFF.
Written by Stanley, Devourer of Souls
Convocation – Ashes Coalesce
Everlasting Spew Records, Sentient Ruin Laboratories
Cover Art: Misanthropic Art
4.6 / 5
