At the time I got this, I had not heard the 'A Farewell to Eden' demo, so I didn't know they'd shifted styles. I was expecting an ass-kicking in the form of brutal, sorrow-filled doom/death. However, when the first strains of "Blood Gathers Frost" came though my speakers and I heard vocalist Rick McCoy sing (in a clean voice) "Get the fuck away from me/You can't save me now", I almost fell over laughing. That line would be great for a death growl due to the angry nature, but his clean vocals just can't get that anger across to the listener. He says he stopped with the brutal vocals because he wanted to expand his vocal range. Whatever. I'm sure he dropped the style so they would get signed. This album, on the whole, sucks.

There are only three good songs, the first three: "Blood Gathers Frost", "If I Could Exist" and "By Love's Will. . .Chaos". Those are the only tracks that hold my attention as they have relatively catchy riffs and actually hold some melancholic atmosphere. That atmosphere must have just been left over from the old days, because when "By Love's Will. . ." ends, it's all downhill from there. There is ZERO aggression on this album, as there has been on Avernus's past releases. As mentioned in my previous Avernus review, Rhiannon's vocals are always cool to hear, but not even that can save this pathetic crap. '. . .Of the Fallen' is too clean, too soft, too commercial, TOO GOTH. It's a slap in the face.

© 1999 goden